


I Have Known a Bird to Sing While in the Egg

by pudgy puk (deumion)



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Baroque Poetry, Country Matters, Creative Interpretation of Canon Elements, Cunnilingus, Cyrano de Bergerac Homage, Drama, Erotic Dreams, F/M, Magical Disability Aids, Romance, Size Difference, Smut, Story within a Story, Sustained Orgasm, Sweater Girl, Voice Kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-17
Updated: 2019-04-17
Packaged: 2020-01-15 14:58:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 30,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18501340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deumion/pseuds/pudgy%20puk
Summary: How do you save someone from herself?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Out of gratitude for support received, I held a poll on my twitter to decide what project I would make next, and NSFW urianger/y’shtola voice kink, inspired by the recent Shadowbringers trailer, won! So here it is. Takes place between patch 4.3 and 4.4, takes Certain Liberties with Y’shtola’s blindness and the magic she uses to cope with it.

When Y’shtola awoke that morning, all she saw was darkness, and the cold voice of Garlemald’s crown prince still haunted her ears. But she had not let waking like that slow her down all these past moons, and she did not plan to begin today. As she sat up in her bed, she reached within herself, to her aether—bright and gentle, and by now coaxing it into something like a lantern was a moment’s task. With her next exhale, light (or something close enough) began to fill her room, most of it comfortingly familiar in the late morning angles of the sun.

Only most—burning her aether to see, no matter how convenient she found the metaphors of candles and lanterns, did not reveal the world in the same way at all. Aether, not light, was now her illumination, and Y’shtola had quickly learned that it did not feel the same respect for the commonly-agreed-upon reality as mundane lights and eyes of flesh. Seeing the aether revealed things that her eyes before had never been able to perceive—and some things only real by a creative definition of the word. Y’shtola scowled at the empty middle of her room, and the Zenos she had dreamed of smirked back at her, fondling the handle of his katana.

He was fading quickly—as all dreams did, even ones of that monster—and while usually Y’shtola ignored whatever little fragments of dreams remained upon waking, this time she stared him down.

_You are dead_ , she pronounced firmly (if only in her mind; only a madwoman would try to talk _out loud_ to her own dreams). Zenos was dead, she had seen his corpse and helped bury it. _You are dead, and we are alive_. Yet as he faded, she couldn’t make the specter drop his damn smirk.

She stayed watching, lip curled contemptuously, until she was sure nothing of the dream remained, then slid out of bed, grabbing the closest clothes at hand before hurrying to wash up. There was so much work to do—and she’d slept so late… Y’shtola sighed. She’d asked the others to wake her if she slept overlate, as she felt it was growing into a problem, and the past few days, they had—why not today? It wasn’t as if the realm was getting safer. In fact…

She looked up into the mirror above the washbasin, and hovering above her head once again was Zenos’s face, frozen in the expression he’d worn when he cut her down and in dozens of dreams since—but this marked the first time he’d stalked her dreams since the Warrior of Light had brought the impossible news from the east and Thancred the miserable confirmation from the lichyard.

_You are dead. I buried you myself._

Once again, she glared at the fragment of dream until it dissolved into a memory of a memory, then furiously began scrubbing at her teeth. It was past time to get to work.

 

As she had suspected, the Rising Stones was bustling with activity by the time she was—not _slinking_ , but not drawing attention to herself and her late arrival. There were guests and deliveries to receive, messages to read and send, finances to manage, briefs and debriefs, research, training, experimentation… everywhere she turned, she could find a task needing done.

Everywhere, that is, excepting the table where she’d left her research in the early morning bells.

“Where,” she said, slowly and delicately, “is my work?” Even though she’d spoken softly, it seemed like a suspicious hush came over the area. No one answered her—even more suspicious—until:

“Lady Y’shtola.” Urianger had the sense to announce his presence behind her, his voice deep and—she thought—carefully blank. She turned to face him, crossing her arms over her chest. At the edges of her vision she noticed a few people had found an excuse to get away while a few more found a reason to crowd closer, and she smiled thinly.

“You are here to tell me where my work is, I presume?” It came out with more of an edge than she had really intended, but her excuse was that she’d had an unpleasant morning already.

He gave her a solemn nod. “Verily, I have.”

“And?” Y’shtola prompted. “Where is it?” Urianger’s overdramatic fondness for overdramatic pauses aside, she had work to do.

“It is put aside, away from thy hands and eyes,” Urianger said, now folding his arms over his chest to match her. “Until thy proper vigor and aptitude hath returned, we will have thee rest.”

“…I’m sorry, what?” Y’shtola was not angry, yet. “You want me to do _nothing_ , today?” One foot was tapping, and her tail lashing.

He nodded. Another innocent bystander excused herself.

“Garlemald masses to retake its colonies, the primal threat to the realm remains, _Zenos is walking again_ , and you want me to do _nothing_?” Yet. Her fingers and knees trembled from that “yet.”

“Pray understand—all of the Scions believe thou and us and e’en the realm entire best used by thy recuperation, lest illness creeping turn to fever burning.” Urianger remained the picture of placid calm as he spoke—which, Y’shtola realized, was probably the reason why he was the one breaking the news to her. Well then.

“Do you _really_ believe that?” Not for the first time she entertained the notion of lifting his goggles with aether—to make what eye contact a blind miqo’te conjurer and a reclusive elezen scholar _could_. It’d make talking to him so much more…personable, if she wasn’t looking at tinted glass and aetheric instrumentation.

“I do not,” he said—and just as Y’shtola leveled a sharp squint at his inscrutable goggles, and opened her mouth to negotiate, he continued, “In sooth, when we our plans laid, my insistence was that thou remain not at rest but abed.” Y’shtola’s mouth stayed open, but now with very different underlying connotation. “I was overruled only by the majority will, not wisdom.”

“Let me get this straight.” Y’shtola, annoyed, was pinching the bridge of her nose while tapping one foot, distracting herself from blood rushing through her, to her agitated tail from her backturned ears. “You’ve all hatched some kind of _conspiracy_ —” here more people left, it was only bare hangers-on and Tataru still in the hall “—to keep me from working during some of the most crucial days for the future of the entire _realm_ —no, the entire _star_ —because you think my _health_ —just _one_ person’s health—is more important?”

Urianger nodded—once, ponderously—and despite herself Y’shtola had to give him full marks for resolve.

“Fine. I’m sure you understand I have no intention whatsoever of acceding to this wish.”

“I would be a fool to so presume,” Urianger said evenly, uncrossing his arms and letting them fall to his sides, surprising Y’shtola with his openness. “How many years since we were made acquaintance, Y’shtola? In all of them I never saw nor heard tell of a single force upon this star or beyond it that hath power enough to stand against thy will and even dream of emerging the victor.” He hesitated a bare moment. “Even when the Lifestream took from thee the light of thine eyes, thou chose to wrest all other lights so to see.”

“So—why then—” Usually she had no difficulty understanding him, but something about him—or was it her? the blood and her beating heart muffling his words, so that she couldn’t quite make sense of him.

“Know that I am resigned, if thou deem’st it meet, that thou shall find and retake thy work and like as not extract whatever vengeance ‘pon me thou desires,” Urianger continued, seemingly unaware of Y’shtola’s disorientation. “Merely though I would beg of my lady: Please, rest. Think of days beyond the immediate future, think of years yet to come, and—”

He cut himself off when Y’shola suddenly drew herself up to her full height (as little a difference as it made with the likes of him), raised her chin to fix him with a haughty glare, and said “I—am—” before abruptly toppling backwards.

To her credit, the blackout lasted barely a second, and she regained consciousness before she might have hit the floor. To his credit, she wouldn’t have hit the floor at all—when she came back to, she didn’t need to unscramble her aether into vision to know he’d caught her, the feel of the coarse, thick linen of his robes and his voice and breath above her was enough.

“Lady Y’shtola?” He sounded anxious, despite his just-professed belief in her indomitability.

“I—am—” Y’shtola continued woozily, tail twitching, “open—to negotiation.”

Urianger sighed very softly, and even though she couldn’t see and even if she could he always wore those damn goggles, she was certain he was rolling his eyes.

 

Negotiations, as far as Y’shtola was concerned, were going poorly. She hadn’t even lost consciousness (she was very deliberately _not_ saying fainted. That would be absurd. Maidens in trashy love stories fainted. And swooning was right out) for a full minute, yet found herself with perilously few allies (zero, to put an exact number on it) as she tried to wheedle, cajole, reason and bribe Urianger into the return of her books.

“I still say,” she muttered, after yet another entreaty met with no sympathy, “that I’ll have time enough to rest _after_ the world is saved.”

“Supposing,” Urianger sighed, “thou hast the right of it, that the threat shall be staved off, that thy health will last the effort. Suppose it doth unfold in such manner. How many days shall pass, dost thou believe, ere the _next_ primal is summoned, the _next_ Imperial fleet launches, the _next_ Ascian sets his foul machinations in motion?” He rested both elbows on the table between them, steepling his fingers. She thought she saw more than the usual darkness in the shadows he cast. “Will they patiently await thy rest?”

“They’re not patiently awaiting a damn thing _right now_ ,” Y’shtola pressed. “Now _cannot_ be a time to rest.”

“Never in all the ages of this star will evil await our convenience,” Urianger said. “That is why thy rest must be seized when any chance doth arise, when—”

“—’When the need is keenly felt,’” Y’shtola groaned, exactly matching Urianger’s cadence as he finished that sentence. “We’re arguing in circles, Urianger. Just give me my research back!”

His brow furrowed above and around his goggles, and he groaned in frustration at her. “Damnable…” He didn’t finish that sentence (which was wise) but even so Y’shtola felt a twinge of sympathy for him. This had turned into a contest of wills—which she was used to winning—but this one was between the inexorable force (her) and the apparently immutable object (him)…

“If I may—” A light male voice piped up from off to the side—Coultenet. “I couldn’t help but overhear…”

Surely that was a lie, but Y’shtola declined to raise the objection. “Yes?”

“If—Mistress Y’shtola, you are spending your energy not only on work, but…” he swallowed, and Y’shtola could detect a frisson of anxiety in him, and had a feeling she could tell where this was going. “But also, you burn your aether for vision all day as well. Perhaps—if you were to stop that for a few days, it might speed recovery.”

Y’shtola didn’t answer him for a moment, but tapped her chin and closed her eyes in thought. The latter gesture by now was near-meaningless for her—but all the same, she did, and even entertained letting the aether fade… before snapping it back into inhumanly sharp focus, and brilliant color, until the feathery individual strands of his hair, threads of his robe, and flutter of his pulse in his throat were clear as brightest day.

“Coultenet,” Y’shtola said crisply, “How, precisely, do you think I will be able to do my research—which involves reading and writing—in such a condition?”

“Ah—”

And this, of course, was what really underlaid the concerns, Y’shtola knew—of course this was what it all was about, this was always what everything was about. Oh, Urianger talked around it, talked over it, but she could tell—she could see Master Matoya’s disapproving frown in him, her shadow purpling his blue robes like a bruise. All other discussions of “her health” were frivolous window dressing compared to the matter of how she had chosen to cope with blindness. But it was her choice, and she stood by it. What else could be better? To relearn how to read, how to fight, how to write? No. No, she wouldn’t have enough _time_. There would never be _enough time._

“With mine assistance.” That was Urianger’s much deeper voice, and he was leaning forward as he spoke. “But for a sennight, Mistress, let us collaborate. Allow me read for thee, write for thee, see for thee, and burn no more of thy life but allow its regrowth in such ashes as already so lie.”

Y’shtola was stopped short by the urgency in his voice—by something she could have sworn was _passion_. Enraptured recital of prophecy, poetry, and the like, yes, that she knew well from him, but never before had she had directed at or even near her, and she was, frankly, taken aback. She had just enough time to wonder (and feel immediate guilt for wondering) how Moenbryda had felt when _she_ had been the target of his rhapsodizing before Coultenet (now, she could see, backed up and heartened by Hoary Boulder behind him) spoke up. “Yes—would something like that work?”

“I think it sounds good,” Hoary contributed, a wide grin on his face (Y’shtola wondering how much it was there to back up Coultenet rather than his own argument). “The more thoroughly you rest, the less time it takes.”

She suppressed a sigh and, still in denial that she wasn’t going to be able to negotiate a better offer, turned back to Urianger. “Are you quite certain your voice will hold out?”

“Nay, I admit—but should I need rest of mine own…” He raised his arm to gesture towards Coultenet and Hoary Boulder, who seemed to grasp his meaning as quickly as if they too had aether-sight.

“We shall take it from there,” Hoary readily agreed. “Shouldn’t be a shortage of us here willing to lend you our eyes for a hand with our own matters!”

Something about his offer made a lump well in her throat, misshapen and painful—and on a sudden impulse, a violent twisting of emotion that left her unwilling to worry them, because why did she even do this in the first place but to —Y’shtola conceded. “Fine. Very well. Just—just let me…” Already she could tell the spike of feeling would fade—but, nevertheless, she was bound by it. She stood from the table, and went around it to stand before Urianger. He stayed seated, like he was obedient and respectful instead of obstinate and unyielding, looking up into her face behind his blank goggles, curiosity in the lines of his brow. Y’shtola took a deep breath. “Don’t let me fall,” she muttered, and upon blowing that breath out she released her tightly-wound aether, and like blowing out a candle the light faded from the room, the shadows deepened to pitch, and a glint of light off of his aetherometer was the last thing she saw.


	2. Chapter 2

In the stacks of the Scions’ library, amidst the smell of old paper and parchment, and the feel of dust in the air and remembered claustrophobia, Y’shtola settled into a massive, lumpy old chair, badly in need of new upholstery. A few fulms away, she heard wood scrape against tile, then softly groan: Urianger must be at his desk, now.

“Ready?” She asked, voice slightly shaky. She wasn’t used to this sort of study—hidden down in a vault, like a valuable herself—but the prospect of being read aloud to in the main rooms of the Rising Stones, where anyone and everyone might could walk in, or overhear the entire time, was even less desirable.

(And staying visionless was the least desirable, but that was a thought she firmly pushed away).

“I am well-prepared,” Urianger replied, and at least his voice was calming. “Matters of the grief-stricken seeking to return life to their beloved and honored dead be represented well amongst our literature.” For obvious reasons, of course—given the Scions’ enemies and their natures. And while the odds were high that an Ascian wore Zenos’ corpse for convenience, instead of it being a “proper” resurrection attempt… well, both Y’shtola and Urianger were strong believers in thoroughness.

“It’s hard to imagine anyone grieving Zenos,” she said, twisting a thread unraveled from the arm of the chair between her fingers. “Or Varis capable of feeling such grief.”

“I hath only ever heard of the exploits that did bring them infamy—never laid eyes upon them,” Urianger said, more quietly than before. “Yet still the picture painted for me is a horror: Men with less pity in their hearts than starving jackals—”

“And, unlike starving jackals, the power to end countless lives.” Y’shtola pulled and snapped that stray thread, then let her fingers feel for another.

“Yet still these monsters be men—with families, wives and mothers. Were they born so wicked that no soul could grieve them?” Urianger’s voice was bitterly musing in nature—she could hear the usually deep, resonant tones scratch up higher in his throat. “Or, perhaps, is it the lot of fiendish men and women to only hold others like them in regard high enough to grieve?”

“We don’t know much of Varis’s wife,” Y’shtola said, smoothing her fingertips over the metal fasteners that attached the upholstery to the wooden arm of the chair, over and over. By their perfect round smoothness, they must have been quite old. “Less of the rest of the imperial household—which surely is rather more people than papa, mama, and baby. Less than we _should_ have taken the trouble to learn.” Her lips were twisted, discontent, and she kept running her fingers along the line of brads. It would be unusual for a carpenter or upholsterer to keep such banal fasteners out, at least if they had any sense—it must have been some cunning feature of the chair’s original design, to make the nuts and bolts of holding it together do double duty as its decoration. But—without the use of her eyes, she couldn’t tell, she couldn’t know. What color were they? What metal? For a bare instant she considered using her aether to take a peek, but—

“And we are remiss to imagine that only a parent’s love might drive the resurrection of he who—despite everything—was still heir apparent to the mightiest empire in ages astral and umbral alike.” The bitterness was shaken off, now, and Urianger’s voice had purpose now. “The first text I have details resurrection plots in ancient Mhach—for I ween their ruthless beseeching of the void in their mad pursuit of power to be the most similar to the situation now facing this star.” From the volume of the dull _kthumpf_ the book made as it hit his desk, she and he would be here for a while—and from the moment of hesitation between the spine creaking and the pages sliding apart with a gentle _shfff_ , dust blooming into her nose revealing the _age_ of the volume, probably Urianger at least would be in his element now. Even though the odds were against his looking at her right then, mutely Y’shtola shook her head, but fondly, expression a combination of a lopsided smile and wrinkled brow. Back in Sharlayan, no one was her superior in practical application—and they were far enough apart in age to have never been pitted against each other in matters theoretical… but…

“If thou art ready?” His voice was soft—probably simply because in the near-absolute silence of the stacks, he had to so pitch his voice to spare their acute hearing. But still—still, it seemed like a gesture beyond that, from some unnameable quality of the spaces between words and tones too small to be noted on any staff. Maybe he _had_ been looking.

“Yes,” Y’shtola said, settling her hands in her lap, against the smoothness of her new robes. “You may begin.”

“A copy of a diary entry by a Lady Calcewitt, dated to the tenth sun of the third umbral moon, in the year 368 of the Fourth Astral Era. A Watersday, after the eighth evening bell.” His voice had a smooth and almost mechanical precision to it as he recited the raw data, but there was a shift to something more personable as he continued. “‘Adonia visited today. She brought my grandchildren, and told me my son continues to worsen—’”

The matriarch’s diary, Y’shtola realized. Probably the protagonist, such as it were, of whatever infamous incident this was. She listened, silent and still, as Urianger read out first her diary, then her husband’s—then letters and notes from Adonia and her ailing husband, and slowly the affair took shape in Y’shtola’s mind. The Lord and Lady Calcewitt’s eldest—and favorite—son, promisingly wed but seven years ago, had taken ill suddenly, then died of it (and Y’shtola couldn’t help but try to discern what the illness was through the filter of third-hand descriptions and three thousand years; impossible to say for sure but she suspected a mild infection that then took root in his lungs and was allowed to fester). His natal family was mad with grief and perhaps madder to lose their in-laws, and—as Urianger related, it led them down a vile path. His narration stayed steady as he related the mother and sire’s increasing desperation, even as Y’shtola was sure she could tell the exact moment they departed decency and reason in their twisted love of their son—if it could even be called love anymore. His voice only began to hesitate when Adonia’s letters and diaries began to reveal the form of their plot to bring him back—her horror at first the plot and then its demands, millennia away from the stacks, came so alive in Urianger’s voice that Y’shtola’s blood ran cold when she put the last pieces—”blood of his blood”—together. The last document he read aloud was the diary of Lady Calcewitt’s grandchild, which ended abruptly with an entry where he complained he was being sent away alone with his nurse to the cottage, which he hated and found boring, and he missed his grandparents, and he wanted to be home again, and the moments of earlier hesitation turned to full pauses for composure, almost as strange in Urianger’s voice as the simple, plaintive words of a long-dead child.

“That’s the end of it?” It had been so long since Y’shtola had spoken, her voice sounded like an intruder.

“The end of their story, as they told it,” Urianger said, accompanied by the sound of a page flipping. “Their story as told by others—that doth continue. Even unto today.” There was a bit of a pointed weight to that last sentence, and Y’shtola thought he probably accompanied it with a pointed look in her direction.

Taking his prompt, she shook her head scornfully, lip curled in contempt. “Voidsent, Ascians, or even ‘just’ necromancers—they promise gifts. But in the end, they will always demand sacrifice.” Disgusting—and the Mhachi of all people should have known better to believe otherwise for even an instant.

“Thou didst reach the very same conclusion as their countrymen, then,” Urianger observed, and Y’shtola thought his tone was strangely neutral for how he had audibly struggled to stay even-tempered earlier.

“I’m not sure what other conclusion there is to draw. The implications are clear—and consistent with what I know of magic and monsters alike.” She drummed her fingernails against the wooden part of the chair arm. “There’s no getting something for nothing there. And I know you know that.” Now it was her turn to direct a pointed raise of the eyebrows in the direction of his voice.

“Verily, I do.” Y’shtola thought she heard him swallow before he continued. “Yet as I know aught, I know how easily malice, carelessness, and error twist the words—and how hard it is to set aright words twisted centuries upon centuries ago.” Another page turned, and she heard his chair groan and sandal leather creak from changing his position. “So wealthy a family would have its share of enemies, opportunists keen to see wicked conspiracy in the tragic twists of fate.”

“You think the text unreliable?” Her eyes narrowed in an impatient squint. He couldn’t have spent so long on such a story just to fall into doubts like this afterwards… “Well. Do you know who acquired it for the Scions’ library?”

“Yes—”

“And would they have allowed a pack of lies into the archives?” He sighed at her, but she pressed on. “Or are you simply extra sentimental today?” Given the little conspiracy he himself had been a part of earlier, surely there was some extra sentiment floating around the Rising Stones, she thought.

“Lady Y’shtola.” From his voice, she thought she might have been a bit harsh, but only allowed herself a twinge of guilt before pressing on.

“Never mind the historiography now. Let’s review it as if it were all true. All real.” Y’shtola took in a deep breath. “The description of the man they went to for the ritual matches the known guises of Ascians—but I generally expect their meddling to reach for higher stakes.”

“Sadism for mere sport is a game best played by voidsent,” Urianger agreed. “Some baronet of the void would consider scandal, chaos, and a few new souls to sup upon a prize worth their while.” Disdain dripped from his voice, and once again Y’shtola narrowed her eyes in his direction. Even for Urianger, this was an unusual level of investment in antiquity. What else could be so concerning him…?

“Moreover it is of a piece with what we know of the proclivities of Mhachi society.” Y’shtola tapped her knuckles against her cheek, considering, slowly curling and uncurling her tail. “They did not fear to consort and contract with voidsent—which rather rules out this method as one we can imagine having to contend with in our situation.” She let out her breath in a sigh, falling back in her chair such that her toes left the ground. “The Empire holds the void in almost as much contempt as we do.”

“And in their magical impotency, Varis must needs rely on foreign expertise to undertake so arcane a mission.” Urianger sighed, and from his direction came a tapping that Y’shtola eventually decoded as irregular drumming of his fingers. “Yet the notion of him consorting willingly with Ascians…allowing one to wear his son’s skin…”

“Van Baelsar dealt with Lahabrea,” Y’shtola pointed out. “And Varis showed himself willing to murder family in the succession conflict. Perhaps it is too generous to assign him the strength and courage of those convictions he claims to possess.”

Another sigh from Urianger—long and drawn-out, and it put her in mind of how he had told the story of that sad, sick little family, like he felt the misery as keenly as if the intervening millennia had been but weeks for him. “Surely, Lady, thou speak’st sweet reason, yet I find myself unwilling to accept it without the greatest revulsion, as though ‘twere foulness instead.”

There was something else there, Y’shtola was sure. His judgment was clouded—but by what, she had no idea. Nor, she reflected ruefully, could she blame this on his demand that she deprive herself of aethersight for a week: he hid his feelings from his face with almost uncanny skill. If he didn’t want her to see how he felt, then…

“Forgive me,” Urianger said, interrupting her reflection with a voice as gentle as when they first began. “I did seek to ease thy nerves in this endeavor, yet mine own feelings did come to rule my mind and tongue, and so bring thee worries anew.” Gentle, but earnest. If he didn’t want her to see…

“Don’t worry about it,” Y’shtola said, firmly pushing her thoughts on all matters unrelated to the salvation of the realm aside. “Is there anything more in that book?”

“My lady, we should be making good time to finish it by midnight.”

“Let’s get to it, then.”

 

Urianger had been honest about the time it would take. She was yawning by the time they had reviewed the last account recorded in that tome, and deemed it—like most of the stories in there—irrelevant to the probable Ascian involvement here. But there were some promising threads, and she’d had Urianger take note of them—names, dates, the quick summaries and the key details—before returning the book to its home. (Whether he had obeyed her stern reminder to write so that people other than he could decipher his script remained to be seen).

Now it was time to be guided back out of the stacks—not back to her room, Y’shtola insisted she could make it that far on her own—but since she could barely make it through the maze of shelfs, racks, tables and cubbyholed walls even with aethersight…

“Left,” Urianger whispered, behind her, and she reached with her left hand to find the thing she would be pivoting around. She appreciated his quiet and uncharacteristic brevity; it felt like he was being considerate of her need for independence (even though it likely had as much to do with other people being asleep just then).

“Thank you,” she whispered back, then “We’re almost there?”

“Almost,” he confirmed, though the thinning of dust in the air (and her nose) could have served as confirmation enough— “Hold, but a moment.”

“Hm?” Y’shtola grunted—then let out a soft, involuntary “Oh,” as she felt a hand—his hand— take hold of hers down by her side, lifting it up to her shoulder level, firmly but carefully held by his own, delicate like—the first coherent thing that came to mind was like being led in a dance, but that was absurd; first of all no dance _she_ knew of would put the lead so directly and artlessly behind the follow, so what—

“The first staircase lieth before us,” Urianger whispered, “and it hath no bannister.”

“ _Urianger_ ,” Y’shtola protested quietly but vehemently, gathering her robes in her other hand for the step up, “I am more than capable of climbing a staircase alone.” She didn’t fight the hand-holding, but let him hold her steady, even putting some weight into it for the more irregular or narrow of the steps (he didn’t falter). His hands were cool and dry and smoothed from years working with the tomes, but hardened from the real work of casting, such that the distinction of where the soft garment leather of his ringbands wrapped over his palm and around his fingers was of an embarrassing amount of tactile interest—but still:

“There. See? No stumbling at all,” Y’shtola said, upon reaching the top of the narrow staircase into the stacks. She withdrew her hand from his, and he allowed it with a little “hm” that may have been slightly impressed or may have been humoring her.

“On the morrow, then, we shall resume here.”

“If you’re late, I can and will head down without you,” Y’shtola wasn’t waiting further but walking on, with one hand on the wall feeling for the bannister that lead up the second set of stairs, the one up to where her rooms were.

“Of course,” Urianger said, and for a mortifying moment she was pleased to not be using aethersight, as otherwise then she’d have been tempted to look back and see if the smile she thought she heard was real.


	3. Chapter 3

The next morning, Y’shtola had honestly forgotten, in the first moments of waking, of all that happened yesterday—and especially that she’d agreed not to use aethersight—so that by reflex she did what she’d promised not to do, igniting her aether. But as soon as she’d sat up in bed, she’d remembered in full—and flopped back onto her pillow with a groan, staring at the ceiling, where the remains of her dreams played out like shadow-puppets on a screen or Allagan projections.

Inconvenient, she thought, frowning as a rainbow of dream-carbuncles chased some magitek contraption across rolling hills. Even if she did feel more like herself than yesterday morning—the _choosing_ not to allow herself to see, after being so accustomed to doing so, was painful. She didn’t want to face it. And besides, wasn’t it possible that bad dreams and a bad night’s sleep were responsible for yesterday’s embarrassment? Certainly dreams of Zenos would leave anyone weaker, as compared to dreams of carbuncles…

Someone knocked at her door then, and Y’shtola instinctively pulled her sheets up over her chest. “Yes?”

“Oh, you’re awake!” Clemence’s voice was muffled by the wood but still recognizable. “Tataru wanted to meet you in the House of Splendors in a bell’s time.”

That was unexpected, but not unwelcome. Except— “She’ll have to ask my minder,” Y’shtola called back, and the sourness in her voice was magnified by the increased volume.

“She already did!” Y’shtola didn’t have enough time to feel properly indignant before Clemence was continuing. “Urianger will be ready to continue working after you’re done! And he said—um—” Here she faltered, and despite herself Y’shtola smirked, “—Well, you know what you agreed to!”

Her smirk faded. Yes, she _had_ made an agreement, hadn’t she? And she hadn’t said “I promise” or anything like that, but…

“Yes, yes,” Y’shtola called back to Clemence, more subdued. “I’ll be downstairs soon.” She turned and swung her legs over the edge of the bed, then padded to her clothes and washbasin. After this, she would let dim her aethersight. After she was sure she wouldn’t accidentally spit on her shirt.

 

Mor Dhona was far less bustling these days than it had been at its peak, but Y’shtola was still glad for Clemence’s escort. She held Y’shtola’s elbow gently, to keep her on the walkway but out of whatever mess Mor Dhona’s adventurers had left on the path this time (and judging by the smells wafting in the air this morning, they were impressive messes), and her chatter was as gentle as she was.

“Remind me,” Y’shtola asked, in response to some harmless gossip the other girl was sharing, “which of the Boulder brothers it is that Aenor fancied, again?”

“Oh, both,” Clemence replied with an aggravated and long-suffering sigh. “Hoary and Ocher both.”

“…Aha,” Y’shtola said, slowly, then offered, “She must have quite the… stamina.”

“You have _no_ idea,” Clemence said, her voice perfectly deadpan—and Y’shtola couldn’t help herself, she barked with laughter, but Clemence was still talking. “I don’t know where she finds the energy, I don’t know where she finds the _time_ —”

“But isn’t—” Y’shtola paused to chortle harder, and be gently led around a bench outside the Splendors, “I rather think Coultenet would object, no?”

“Just because she fancies both, it doesn’t mean she has both.” Clemence’s voice was abruptly quieter—and the air stiller and quieter, which Y’shtola understood to mean they’d entered the House of Splendors (and probably continuing this topic would be more tasteless). “Turn right here, Lady,” Clemence said, leading her to a room where two more female voices chatted.

“Y’shtola! Just in time!” That voice was Tataru’s, but she sounded—-well, rather _higher-up_ than Y’shtola was used to. “Come here, I need to check your measurements!”

“Good morning!” That bright chirp was Aenor, who sounded like she was seated out of the way, spectating.

“Is that all this was about?” If her mood hadn’t been buoyed by the ridiculous gossip, Y’shtola might have been a bit cross. There were other things she could be doing. “My clothes fit fine, Tataru, really.”

“Oh, it’s not that, dear,” Tataru said—as Clemence guided Y’shtola to where Tataru waited. “I’ve taken up knitting, you see! And I think I’m learning quite well, so I’m making you a sweater.” As she spoke, Y’shtola could hear her moving around and—well— _bustling_ about with things that clicked and things that shuffled and rustled alike, before what she recognized as a measuring tape looped around her neck.

“I—Tataru, you’re so kind, but—” Y’shtola cut herself off as her neck was measured (Clemence cautioned Tataru it looked too tight, at least), then continued, “you already have my measurements, don’t you?” From those lovely robes of chimerical felt she’d made, that Y’shtola still wore regularly.

“One must needs be thorough!” Tataru trilled, as her dextrous, sure little hands wrapped the tape first to span Y’shtola’s shoulders, then her bust. “Do you like turtlenecks, dear?”

“Hmm, not particularly—”

“They’re very fashionable now,” Aenor chimed in. “You should make her one like the pattern I showed you, Tataru.”

“Aenor!” Both Clemence and Tataru chided her at once, then Clemence continued, “Lady Y’shtola isn’t trying to seduce anyone, she doesn’t need one like _that_!”

“One like _what_?” Surprise, confusion, and curiosity warred inside Y’shtola.

“It’s just fashion!” Aenor protested—but she sounded too close to laughing to really mean it as protest rather than provocation. “And besides, Clemence—are you _sure_?” Her voice had dropped an octave almost effortlessly—she really was very practiced at this sort of play-acting.

“I’m sure,” Tataru said, in a tone of some finality, as she drew the tape loosely around Y’shtola’s waist. “Lady Y’shtola has important work to get to, she doesn’t have time to dally here and talk about romance and the like.”

“Besides, she can’t see it anyhow,” Clemence added. “Not right now.”

And because she was _so_ very curious what such a notorious pattern could possibly look like, Y’shtola made the mistake of saying “I’m sure Urianger wouldn’t mind a little peek—” before she realized how that would sound… and as the room erupted in gasps and laughter, her priority immediately changed to strategizing to live that one down.

 

“My apologies, I know I’m late,” Y’shtola said, breaking the silence of the stacks. In the distance, she heard a chair scrape, then footsteps: Urianger coming to guide her from the bottom of the stairs to his desk.

“Thou need’st not apologize,” Urianger said when he stood before her. “Thine errand is complete?”

“Yes,” Y’shtola said, one hand on her hip, tracing over her pocket. “Tataru’s clever plan went off without a hitch: she’ll make me warm clothes and now she can check if I’ve lost too much weight for her tastes.”

“That is well,” Urianger said, still placidly calm—if he felt any shame for the implication of aiding in this little conspiracy, it didn’t show in his voice and, Y’shtola knew from memory, almost certainly wouldn’t have on his face either.

And to be fair, she hadn’t truly minded—for one, because she hadn’t discerned that underlying motive until after it was all over: measurements, gossip, brunch, and so forth, and she was walking back to the Rising Stones between Aenor and Clemence and their spirited (but affectionate) arguing. That, paradoxically, had given her the space to catch her breath and realize why she was being troubled when Tataru had been so proud of not needing to do so for her robes, when just eyeballing her (and them) had been enough for her. Probably also that it would get her out in the sunshine had been considered a virtue, and perhaps Aenor and Clemence had something they were watching out for on her behalf. Clemence was a fellow conjurer, after all—and Aenor had indicated she was involved in at least one kind of conspiracy upon their departure: the little book Y’shtola was tracing the contours of in her pocket was a gift from her, slyly slipped there by Aenor during her (entirely unsolicited) hug goodbye. “Show it to Urianger,” she whispered. “It’ll help.”

Needless to say, given Aenor’s tastes and proclivities, Y’shtola had no intention of doing such a thing. “Anyroad. What musty old tome do you have for us today?” She took a few steps forward, and once again let Urianger lead her from behind back to his preferred desk.

“The opposite, my lady—” he said, sounding pleased at having the chance to upset her expectations, “—for I did ask the Lady Alisaie if she wouldst allow us to review some notes from her own journeys, as she did encounter resurrection—or the hideous mockery it entails—in this modern age: the deceit of primals in Bahamut’s coils and Lakshmi’s embrace.”

“Good thinking,” Y’shtola said, taking a familiar-feeling turn into a familiar-feeling opening of air; instinctively she let herself take a deep breath before feeling for the old armchair. And—”Moreover, both concern themselves with parents and their children, rather than other relationships.” She hadn’t really noticed that similarity until now.

“Yes—” Urianger sounded a bit too eager, spoke a bit too quickly. Clearly he had noticed this trend before she had. “Quite a boon from the Spinner, to have so recently shown us the sordid affair brought to a head, and with certainty, before Garlemald spun so new a strategy, a treachery.”

“And recorded it in Alisaie’s handwriting, not her twin’s,” Y’shtola drily observed. “Good luck.”

“It is not so dissimilar to mine own,” he returned, over the sound of a little fastener undone and a book falling open—with what sounded like at least two dozen loose-leafs falling out as well. “…Would that she shared the care for pagination,” Urianger sighed.

Y’shtola softly laughed. “I’ll wait.”

It didn’t take as long as she feared for him to piece together the pieces of Alisaie’s account of the Qalyana broodmother’s loss, and she spent the time contemplating the embroidery on the big upholstered armchair in which she sat. Whenever this was new (which was probably sometime before she was born), it must have been impressive to look at—now, though, she thought it probably would look shabby: she could feel where stitches had been stretched out, loosened, or frayed or even snapped with all the use this chair had seen—if not here, in the dusty archives, then with however many previous owners it had had. For a moment, Y’shtola wondered about them—who were they, how many years, did they mostly store it or actually use it? She had no idea about this, or about so many others of the things lurking down here—whether standing on four wooden legs or walking on two gangly elezen ones.

“It’s done,” Urianger said. “Shall I read it?” When she nodded, trusting that he would see it, he began.

And of course he did not do anything so foolish as mimic the sound of her voice or mannerisms, yet still Y’shtola could plainly hear that it was Alisaie whose words he recited—that it was not his own thoughts, but someone else: younger, clever, impatient and fast-moving but also reticent, uncomfortably reflective. With one half of her mind Y’shtola followed the tale of the doomed Qalyana daughter, from her time as hostage, to her death, and then the mother’s grief unending—with the other half she wondered if she would have noticed this remarkable quality Urianger gave the narration if she were a stranger, ignorant to the owner of the voice and the writer of the words alike. She liked to think she would have grasped it, even as Urianger once again followed Alisaie into a self-berating tangent.

“I hadn’t realized she blamed herself so,” Y’shtola mused, quietly—she hadn’t properly intended to speak out loud, even, much less interrupt Urianger, but all the same he stopped reading.

“Mistress Alisaie feels everything most keenly—yet nothing wounds her more sharply than herself, her own failures,” he said, with a touch of sadness, yet as fondly as if she were his own child.

“Mm—but even so, this is hardly a recounting of her _failure_. There were forces in motion she had no way to stop—barely any way to properly anticipate. No reasonable person could blame her for that debacle.” Even though Y’shtola had the benefit of knowing multiple versions of this story—as it was told by the Warrior of Light, for example—even from just this story, it was still clear to her that between Garlean callousness and ignorance, Fordola’s haste, a mother’s grief and a primal’s promises, young Alisaie had little hope of changing anything as much as she wished she did—a thought which made something in her stomach clench, for reasons she wasn’t sure she wanted to understand.

“We are in accord,” Urianger replied, his voice warm, yet still tinged with that same reflective sadness. “Perhaps, if Fate should grant thee a chance, my lady wouldst give this same counsel to Alisaie herself?”

“…Yes,” Y’shtola said, after a moment’s thought. “Yes, that would likely be useful.”

“Thou wouldst have my gratitude,” Urianger murmured, a bit more softly, accompanied by a shuffling of paper. “Many a time hath I tried to convince her so, yet mine efforts have been all in vain. If she did hear it from thy lips, my lady, I dare to think it wouldst not fall upon unhearing ears. Thou and she are very alike, I believe.” In that last sentence, his voice turned very rueful of a sudden, but—”I shall continue now, as it please thee,” Urianger continued, before Y’shtola could ask him anything further, and so she spent the remainder of his reading mentally turning over that brief conversation and especially that sentence, trying to tease out what felt like meaning just under the surface, out of her sight.


	4. Chapter 4

Y’shtola had, in perfect honesty, expected to fall asleep in the midst of hers and Urianger’s little collaborative sessions at least once. For one, a chair probably sized for elezen was easy for a miqo’te like her to near lose herself in coziness. Secondly, in so still a place, beholden to the pace of a man who was deliberative before anything else, and especially without her aethersight—it would have been a miracle if she didn’t drop off briefly at least once. And Urianger asking her for a moment to copy the less personal parts of Alisaie’s account of the summoning of Lakshmi into legible form—well, by then it was already late in the afternoon, by her estimate, with everything warm and the chair soft and the air full of the gentle sounds of his pen scratching on paper. She could tell sleep was coming and did nothing to stop it.

Now she was waking, and the first thing she became aware of was that she had probably slept longer than she had… “planned” was a strong word, but certainly longer than she would have wanted. In darkness like the stacks, like her world without aethersight, she knew this first by temperature: the room she had gone to sleep in had been warm like some manner of benevolent oven, snug under the sun-warmed earth and bricks until perfectly soporific. The room she awoke into was chilly and even drier-feeling than it was in the day, the sun long gone and its warmth gone with it, and if the heat it had left in Mor Dhona had finally leached out of the bricks and wafted away into nothingness—well, it must have been late indeed.

She had two options, now: resign herself to sleeping in this chair all night, or see if she could make her way out of the stacks all alone in the pitch black night. All it took was one draft chasing about her ankles to convince her that she wouldn’t be staying; Y’shtola drew her knees up to her chest with a shiver—and a rustle of cloth whose texture and weight she didn’t remember sitting down with. Graceless and awkward she groped at it, embarrassed to have only just then realized its presence, and found it to be a just a blanket, of pilling old felt but still clean and intact. It had been draped over her front—of course, it must have been Urianger’s doing. She’d have to thank him tomorrow—that is, if she chose to acknowledge that she’d slept all afternoon and into the night at all, which she was still unsure about. But probably she would, she thought. First things first, though: she had to get out of the stacks. So, Y’shtola pushed the blanket off her, draping it over the chair’s arm, and with only an instant of guilt ignited aethersight like striking a match. True, the odds were against there being enough light to see by at this hour, but any light was better than none.

Yet the first thing she saw was a single candle burning in a lantern on the desk before her—and the second was Urianger, sitting silently at the desk, one book from a pile lying open in front of him. Reflexively, Y’shtola jerked from the startlement—which prompted him to look towards her, his hood down and dark goggles put aside.

“Thou art awake,” he said quietly.

“I’m sorry,” Y’shtola said, as her fur laid back down and heartbeat slowed. “I thought I was alone.”

Urianger shook his head, candlelight catching on his silver stubble. “Thou needst not apologize.”

“You haven’t been h—” Y’shtola began to say, then stopped herself as she looked over the desk: on the edge behind the candle was an empty plate and something (she suspected a sandwich) wrapped in paper. He _had_ been here all night, and brought food for her in case she woke to boot. Instead, she said “You didn’t have to stay, you know.” She swallowed, looking between his face (calm, and it turned out his eyes didn’t reveal much but they did betray a bit of concern) and the probable sandwich. “I would have been fine on my own.”

Sighing, Urianger leaned back in his chair, pushing his hair away from his face with one hand. “My lady, it is no imposition on me to spend the evening bells here, nor in watchfulness over thee. Thou needst not apologize,” he repeated.

“I’m just making sure you know. For the future.”

He raised one eyebrow at her—but with an otherwise perfectly straight face, said, “Then on the morrow, shall I give Mistress Tataru permission to wake thee for dinner?”

Y’shtola narrowed her eyes at him—for Urianger to tell a joke was not _entirely_ unheard-of, but… “And breakfast, and lunch.”

“As you wish,” Urianger said, but this time he was smiling. “I trust thou wilt not need mine assistance this time, to repair to thy chambers?”

The guilt from before sparked again at this admission (implied as it was, it was still sufficient) that he knew she was using aethersight even as they spoke, and sternly she tamped it back down. She’d come to this agreement for her own benefit, and her groping blindly in this labyrinth of shelves in the dead of night benefited no one, least of all her, and Urianger was reasonable enough to understand that. She had no reason at all to feel guilty, and expressed this by standing up and stretching before taking the paper-wrapped parcel (yes, definitely a sandwich) from his desk. “I’ll be fine.”

Urianger nodded, but did not return to his work as she walked away—and as candlelight faded behind her, Y’shtola unwrapped her sandwich and took a big bite, for resting was hungry work and she appreciated having something else to think about, besides.

 

That night, she didn’t dream—for her sleep was too fitful and broken-up for it, and it was early in the morning when she finally gave up on getting any more. Groaning, she hauled herself out of bed, too grouchy to congratulate herself for this time thinking before burning her aether in her simulated vision. Instead, she did so deliberately, and with intensified light and shadow, because she hadn’t any intention of figuring out shirt buttons while blind, if there were aught she could do about it.

She did concede to that (damned) agreement she had made shortly after settling down in the common area of the Rising Stones, sitting at a table with a mug of hot tea (spiced in a style that Higiri had assured her was not precisely Doman but anyhow Higiri liked it well enough), watching a window as rain fell outside. Slowly, as if she was falling back asleep, she let aethersight dim and brighten with her breathing, until she was replacing her tea on the table before her by touch and memory, otherwise unaided. It was still too early for many others to be awake, and Y’shtola chose to try and appreciate the solitude and sound of rain, after so much time accompanied and in the parched air of the archive.

This, of course, was Aenor’s cue to take the other seat at her table.

“Good morning, Aenor,” Y’shtola said—taking from the other woman’s startled laugh that the recognition had taken her by surprise, and her tail curled in her lap, a kind of secret, triumphant smile.

“How did you know it was me?” Aenor asked, all good humor.

“Your stride is very confident, and no one else wears that kind of heel,” Y’shtola said, leaning against the window and smiling in Aenor’s direction.

“Ahh,” Aenor said, then the two of them slipped into something of an awkward silence before she broke it again. “You know—and Tataru didn’t get me to ask this—I wonder if there’s something more to the—to all this.” From a swishing noise and a sense of displaced air, Y’shtola believed Aenor had made some kind of gesture, but couldn’t discern what it was (and therefore what Aenor meant).

“To the weather?” she asked, deliberately mildly.

“No—to this _arrangement_ you have going on now,” Aenor said, and even for her the stress she put on that word, “arrangement,” seemed odd. “With Urianger.”

“Well, isn’t it obvious?” Y’shtola said, and heard Aenor hold her breath. “He’s worried about my health, long-term, and is choosing the worst possible time to seize on a minor bit of overworking myself as an excuse to do something about it.” Crossly, she huffed out another breath after finishing that, mentally preparing herself for another argument or to fend off cautionary advice.

Instead, Aenor laughed. “Oh—oh, dearie, no.” Y’shtola’s surprised expression must have been even funnier, because it was a few more seconds until Aenor could speak again. “Not like that—nothing like that!”

“I’m _quite sure_ that’s his motive,” Y’shtola answered, indignant.

“Sure, but—” Here Aenor dropped her voice a bit, and took on that same tone of play-acting that Y’shtola was by now quite familiar with. “Well—some men have… strange tastes.”

It was several seconds before Y’shtola could speak, though distantly she was sure the faces she made were worth several thousand words. “Are you mad?” was what eventually came out.

“Of course not,” Aenor said, sounding mildly perturbed. “It wouldn’t be the strangest taste I could imagine he’d have—”

“ _What_?!”

“—quiet, bookish men are always, in secret—”

“ _Aenor_!” Y’shtola put her tea mug down with enough force to rattle the table. “Our relationship is _purely_ collegiate, I promise you!”

“What’s this?” Apparently they’d attracted Coultenet’s attention—or rather, Y’shtola amended, _she’d_ caught his attention with her outburst (however merited it was). “Is Aenor trying to steal your man too?” Despite his words, his tone was amused and almost affectionate rather than weary, and it sounded like he was coming to join them, even. Briefly, Y’shtola contemplated teleportation.

“I don’t steal men,” Aenor said, accompanied by a light _thwack_ sound. “It’s _sharing_.”

“Sharing,” Y’shtola repeated faintly.

“He’s not interested,” Coultenet said, with the air of someone who has repeated the same thing so many times they can’t even be irritated by it anymore. “I’m sure you’ll be the first to know if that changes.”Aenor made a pleased little hum at that.

“Are you quite finished?” It came out rather a bit more brusque than Y’shtola had intended, but she stood by it.

“One more thing,” Aenor said, slightly sing-song. “Have you had Urianger read that book to you?”

“ _No_.” Y’shtola said and immediately bit her tongue to keep from going on a crueler tirade than Aenor deserved. “I—please,” she breathed out, trying to calm herself. “Don’t.”

“Oh. Well…” Aenor stood, Y’shtola could tell by the sound of the chair legs. “I’ll be—I’ll be going, then.” And she did just that.

Y’shtola sighed, leaning once again against the windowpane, and closing her eyes to concentrate better on the pleasant coolness of the glass against her temple. “I’m going to have to apologize to her, aren’t I?” she asked of Coultenet.

“Perhaps, perhaps not.” He sounded thoughtful. “It’s not the first time she’s overstepped her bounds—may I?” By the sound of the dragging chair legs, Y’shtola assumed he meant to ask if he could sit down at her table; she nodded to give him permission.

“How do you stand it?” Her voice came out a strange mixture of wry exaggeration and sincere frustration.

“What, her?” Coultenet sounded slightly non-plussed. “Aenor’s not _bad_ —just inappropriate, and—” He paused. “—…she’s not _actually_ trying to steal your man, is she…?”

“He’s—not—my—man.” Y’shtola thumped her head against the glass lightly, in rhythm. “Urianger and I aren’t…”

“Ahh…” Coultenet said. “I see, I see.” A pause. “If it helps, I think she’s really the only one thinking that—and well—it’s just the sort of thing she thinks about.”

“That’s… not quite a relief, but…” Y’shtola groaned, sitting up enough to rest her elbows on the table. “It’s better. …Though I hope it doesn’t get back to him. I think he’d be insulted—”

Coultenet made a sputtering sound, then coughed. “I’m sure he holds you in higher esteem than _that_ , Lady Y’shtola!”

“Not—I don’t mean like that,” she said, swallowing a frustrated groan. “Before you came over, Aenor was talking about…” Her voice slowed to a stop, and she rested her head atop her forearms for a moment. Gods… was she blushing? Her face felt warm—either she was blushing or she was developing a fever and neither option was attractive to her at all. “She wondered if Urianger had a proclivity for blindfolding or the like, which is rather cruel, all things considered.”

“Offensive, I understand, but cruel…?” Coultenet was an equal mix of confused and contemplative, judging by the qualities of his voice.

“Well, you did meet Moenbryda, did you not?”

“Of course, but I don’t— _oh_ ,” Coultenet’s voice grew at once intense and hushed. “They were together? I never realized…” He trailed off, probably, Y’shtola thought, about to say something about how hard it was for Urianger now, but— “That explains a lot, honestly.”

“What do you mean?” Her brows were knit with a mix of surprise and curiosity.

“Oh, just—” Like with Aenor, there was that sense of displaced air indicating some gesture that meant nothing to her. “How he behaves. What he worries about. And—yes, that sort of thing.”

“How so?” This was interesting—her ears and eyes were forward. She hadn’t thought much of Urianger and Moenbryda in that light—they’d been either together or in denial about it for almost as long as she could remember knowing either of them, before her passing, so for her it was simply a fact of life on Eorzea, not something that held some kind of special insight.

“Well—I mean, since she gave her life in the struggle, he’s been—oh,” this “oh” was rather quieter, and accompanied by a shuffling noise—

“My lady.” Urianger’s throaty voice took her by surprise; Y’shtola jerked and at once felt the fool for not hearing his approach, for being too distracted—then settling back into resignation.

“How long have you been there?” she sighed, flat-voiced.

“I arrived but a moment before.” He sounded curious, and Y’shtola internally cursed the acuity of elezen hearing. “Wherefore does my lady need to ask?”

“It’d be impolite, to quietly sneak up on a blind woman.” Oh, thank every last one of the Twelve for Coultenet (even though he was just as guilty of the gossip as she was). Even better—

“Thou speak’st true.” Urianger sounded chastened. “I shall shew more consideration.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Y’shtola added hastily. “I presume you have come to collect me for the day?”

It had been so long since she’d heard Urianger laugh, she almost didn’t recognize the sound—dry and rough, yes, but not unpleasantly so; almost sounding like what an affectionate lick from a big coeurl felt like. “Merely I sought more tea, the sun hath barely departed the horizon and begun the day proper.”

For some reason she would not explain to anyone, Y’shtola was red-faced and defensive, and so said, “It’s raining too hard to see the sun.” This was true, she could still hear the background drumming of raindrops, the window she sat next to still radiated a pleasant coolness.

“So it is,” Urianger said, and that he sounded almost congenial wouldn’t be notable if he were anyone else, but so rarely did he sound anything other than serious and contemplative… “Wilt thou allow me a few more bells’ reverie and preparation?”

“Yes,” Y’shtola said, quietly, settling back in her chair as she concentrated on listening (Urianger really did have a catlike tread) and imagining how Coultenet must have been looking at her before he too excused himself. Sitting there alone with her cup of tea, now little more than dregs and as cold as the rain outside, it occurred to her that between yesterday’s slip at the House of Splendors and that embarrassing display just now, she really couldn’t blame Aenor for her presumptions, and the only thing that stopped her from sighing deeply at that was knowing how lovelorn it would seem to be a maiden sitting at a window, sipping tea and sighing.

 


	5. Chapter 5

The rain lasted steadily, not letting up for even a quarter-bell, so when Y’shtola finally went down into the stacks, holding her fourth mug of tea that morning, it was even more slowly and carefully than usual. And as Urianger led her back to their nook, she realized she wasn’t alone in this: wafting in the air was a fresher smell than dust and leather and parchment, a blend of black tea without milk (which was how she knew it wasn’t hers) but with citrus oils and enough lemon that the smell alone could have made her lips pucker. He began coughing as she turned away from him to settle into her chair, and she realized that it must have been for his voice.

“Shall we make this a brief session?” Y’shtola asked, arranging herself in the chair to seem the picture of prim grace and dignity, before she continued: “I would not want you to overtax your voice and overwork yourself.”

“Peace, mistress,” he sighed. “I’ve tea and honey enough for a bear, I shall not lose my voice from simple recitation. Else I were the most benighted student of prophecy e’er Sharlayan brought up to the art.”

“Point taken,” Y’shtola acknowledged, raising her cup as if it were a goblet before taking a drink—then nestling it back between both her hands. The archives, below the surface as they were, may have been extra warm on sunny days, but on chilly, rainy ones, instead they were almost cold.

“Our pace through the material has been quicker than I expected,” Urianger said, pulling her thoughts from the temperature. “What remains are the stories of resurrections perhaps least relevant, but certainly most numerous, and most piteous: lovers bereft of their beloved, seeking their return.” His voice stayed steady and clear and gave no hint that he was aware of the white elephant—rather white Roegadyn—in the room, that Y’shtola was sure would be as clear and vivid as if she still lived, were she using her aethersight.

“Not surprising,” she made herself say. “That it’s the most numerous, that is. Adults old enough to be trained in magical arts, and powerful—yet without experience—will make dangerous choices.”

“They do, at that.”

And there was something in those words, a sadness so deep it was near to fury, that reminded Y’shtola he knew so much more of the circumstances that led a person to make those choices than she could imagine. “I’m sorry.”

“Be at ease,” he murmured, accompanied by a sound of flipping pages. “At this remove, there is naught I can do but weather it.”

She doubted he was looking, but she nodded her sympathy all the same, drawing her legs up under her. This was just for the warmth, curling up catlike in the chair, yet nevertheless something felt very intimate about it.

“I did wonder,” she said, quietly, “that—when Haurchefant was killed. I worried that …she would be that desperate, to seek counsel from such beings of darkness.”

“I did fear such, as well,” Urianger said, mirroring her quiet tone, as if they would be overheard otherwise. “I wonder—how much greater must have been the pain and temptation? For one who hath wrestled gods and brought low primals alone, how much greater the misery to submit to the truth and tragedy of our mortality?”

“I don’t suppose you or I will ever know,” Y’shtola murmured, tracing the rim of her mug with one finger. She wasn’t sure if that lack of knowledge ought to be consider a blessing or a curse, and the simple wondering thereof felt uncomfortable to her, like the sort of things one who walked with the Circle of _Knowing_ ought never contemplate—

“And I believe, in this case, that may be a mercy.” Once again, he flipped through pages. “Shall we begin, my lady?”

It could not be honestly said that this session passed quickly. Almost every sad little story followed the same structure: Two star-crossed lovers were happy together until fate found a way to strike them, leaving one dead and the other so grieved they (knowingly or no) sought the darkness to beg the beloved’s return. Over and over, with only minor differences—the most salient to their research being the different methods of resurrection—this repeated itself, until Y’shtola was in danger of nodding off again, numbly repeating whichever details were important enough for her to want Urianger to take note of them for later. It was past lunchtime when they finally reached the end—and Urianger informed her that there was a volume two.

“Gods, _why_ , though?” Y’shtola groaned, immediately following it with “Don’t answer that. I know. But—” She didn’t finish the sentence, instead yawning deeply.

“Doth thou desire a bell to rest?” Urianger sounded suspiciously like he was fending off a yawn as well.

“Just more tea,” Y’shtola said, rubbing her eyes. “And maybe a miq’abob.”

“As you wish,” he said mildly, “only pray allow me put these books aright before we leave.”

“Of course.” Once again, she had nothing to do with her waiting but sit and think, about whatever presented itself: the topic of their study was not precisely riveting at the moment; the state of the realm entirely too much so; her companion—so, once again, she turned to thinking of the chair and the patterns of embroidery, fascinating under her fingers. Were they representative of anything, she wondered, or simply geometric? Not all of the gaps she could feel seemed like deterioration, but were too regular, which she thought meant a geometric pattern, but maybe a floral or a botanical design would use such—

“Mistress Tataru bought it from salvagers, shortly after the Calamity.” Urianger’s voice intruded upon her thoughts. “I think it the product of a northern Shroud atelier, that did endeavor to entice both Gridanian and Ishgardian custom alike, from both its size and its ornament. It has been refurbished at least once, methinks, for its wood is too old for the fashion of lattice—lilies and roses, abstracted—stitched ‘pon its back and seat.”

Y’shtola turned her face to the sound of his voice, an uneasy smile crinkling the corners of her unseeing eyes. “Am I that transparent?”

He paused, and then said, “The fabric is sage green, and the stitching white, though miscolored from age.”

“I’ll take that as a ‘yes,’ then.” And presumably, if he had time to give her the chair’s origin story, he had finished with the shelving, so she pushed herself out of that chair to follow Urianger up and out. “Sometimes I forget how sharp your vision is.” Probably it was to do with the goggles, and how reluctant he was to ever remove them.

“No more so than any other man,” he demurred, with one hand guiding her to the left. “And less than many.”

“Don’t be so modest—if I’ve met one oaf with an overinflated ego who couldn’t see the obvious right in front of him, I’ve met a hundred.” It seemed to be something of an occupational hazard for miqo’te outside of their home tribes, she thought.

“Still, compared to those truly great among men, I can but aspire,” Urianger said, and Y’shtola was about to ask him if he meant Louisoix before he had taken her hand in his once again—like before—to help her up that staircase. And probably it was for the best, she thought as she wrapped her fingers tightly around his, because the grief of Moenbryda’s loss was already in the fore of both their minds, and it seemed to be his sad lot, to endure so much loss, when—(she stumbled on a creaky stair, but he was strong enough and steady enough that she didn’t fall)—when his ambition seemed to be not to join those great men and women of history, only to lend them his aid—

“There,” he whispered as both of them emerged on the ground floor. “If thou hast no more need of me anon…?”

“…We still have that second volume,” Y’shtola said, with a crisp professionalism she didn’t quite feel. “No more than a bell for lunch.”

“As you wish.”

 

She’d hoped that lunch would restore not just her vigor, but the real sense of professional, collegiate camaraderie that she had had the day before last yet was only feigning now. Alas, it did nothing of the sort: no spicy miq’abob or refreshing salad or even triple-brewed Hannish coffee (or as close as Higiri could manage this far west) could dispel that horrendously awkward feeling, like a maiden sighing at a window while drinking tea. (And, frankly, Tataru’s approving hums as she knit made it _worse_ by reminding her of yesterday). By the time she was to rejoin Urianger down in the archives, she may have shed all sleepy languor… but it might have been preferable to her overkeen senses and overactive mind. Gods, she thought she’d left this nonsense behind years ago.

At the least, she thought as she carefully descended that narrow staircase, at the least there was only four more days of it, and then she’d be free. Maybe it was because of her blindness. Maybe being forced to acknowledge it was causing some kind of temporary insanity, or perhaps it was just the stress. Maybe, if she could sneak some time with her aethersight, instead of sitting blindly waiting, it would help—

—such as now, as, Y’shtola realized, she had somehow managed to beat Urianger back down to the archives and thus he was not there to guide her. _Gods_. It _must_ be temporary insanity. She didn’t want to countenance the alternative.

“My lady?” Urianger’s voice came from above and behind her, and sounded more than a little surprised, not that she could blame him. “I had not realized thou wert so eager,” he said, over the sound of the stairs creaking as he descended to the archives, and again, she couldn’t blame him. As he drew close, she offered a brief prayer of thanks to the Twelve that she, as a miqo’te, physically could not tuck a lock of hair behind her ear, that dead giveaway gesture she’d seen so many smiling hyuran and elezen and Roegadyn girls do (and so long as she faced him dead on, he couldn’t see how her tail gestured).

“I thought my eagerness to work was at the root of this,” Y’shtola remarked.

“Ah—touche, my lady.” Urianger sounded like he was smiling. Really? Again, and so soon? This must be some kind of record for the year. Why—oh, he was still speaking, about how he knew she was passing unfond of these depths, and it had completely gone over her head and this was absolutely confirmation that she was temporarily insane and stupid from it to boot, acting like she was ten years younger from—

“Y’shtola?”

“It’s nothing,” she said, fully aware of how unconvincing she sounded.

“Of course,” Urianger said, fittingly unconvinced. “If you will allow me to lead…?”

“—Yes. Yes, right. Of course.” She turned, let him guide her (his hand on hers, yet again), and with a deep, internal sigh of resignation, decided she was going to deal with this like the adult she was, the first step of which would be acknowledging that she had some kind of… infatuation.

Her sigh became external as she fell into her chair. Denial accomplished nothing, as she knew very well and had cautioned others very recently, even—but that didn’t mean it didn’t have its own appeal, its own comfort. If she wasn’t, for whatever reason, infatuated with him…

“The second volume—a full third of it is but one tale, the rest broken into shorter stories belike the morning’s work. Hath thou any preference?”

“The short ones first.” Gambling that they were more of the numbingly identical stuff as the morning, Y’shtola planned to use the spare brainpower to work through these… _feelings_ before they embarrassed her any further. “Then it will feel like a treat to work through whatever monstrosity that is, knowing it is the last one.”

“My lady, one would believeth thou the less eager to work,” Urianger said drily, calling back to her earlier remark and dear gods but suppressing her chuckle was harder and tenser work than she was sure she could expect from most of the drivel in that volume two. After clearing his throat, Urianger began reading, and Y’shtola allowed his voice to wash over her while she focused on the far more pressing matter (no matter how it galled her to admit it) of her damnable emotions.

And it wasn’t Urianger’s fault, if she was approaching the whole mess rationally (she wasn’t, but she was _trying_ ). Her frustration with his too-helpful devotion to her wellbeing over that of the realm aside—her emotions were her own affair to manage. Just— _why_ , why had such a stupid infatuation taken hold _now_? Never mind the long-term (and the Twelve knew she didn’t)—the realm depended on her now, and besides, how many years had she known him? It made no sense. This sort of girlish stupidity was, she thought, a hallmark of _not_ knowing the target of the feelings.

(“Thinkst thou the manner of deception here reminiscent of the Ascians?” Urianger asked.

“Not only them, but one by name.” Y’shtola took a deep breath. “Lahabrea.” The approving hum he responded with had a roughness that would be a perfect complement to a pen nib on paper, a perfectly regular tremble that was, no doubt, as involuntary as the way the fur on her ears prickled from the hearing.)

But then, if she looked more closely at her memories, an answer presented itself, rather too much like a metaphorical elephant in the room. Aye, years it had been since she and he were first acquainted, and if she thought back to the moment of introduction, it had been by Moenbryda herself and even that same evening, she had caught them both stealing glances at each other in a very particular way. Indeed, even at the time she had had reason to notice and think upon it, for she recalled how different it was to be observing two people making them from being the target of such sorts of furtive looks. And that would explain it, would it not? If she’d known from the start that he was Moenbryda’s, then…

(“No,” Y’shtola responded to something Urianger said, only half heard, half-recalled if she searched her mind.

“Th’art certain?” He sounded skeptical, his tone rising but still, even so, so—

“No,” she admitted, and tried to _listen_ this time. To words, not voices).

Perhaps that was the answer, but then, perhaps not—surely she’d endured too many tragic love stories this day to be able to say with certainty that knowing he was another’s would surely stop pointless infatuation developing.And, for that matter—was she so sure he did not still belong to Moenbryda? Death, after all, did not defeat love, and—and besides, she abruptly chided herself, what was she _doing_ , to try and reason out a way this infatuation _wasn’t_ pointless and was somehow acceptable? Gods. _Gods_ , temporary insanity…

(“A repugnant tale,” Urianger added to the same breath as the last line of whatever little story they were on, she could hear the heat of his disdain in the puff of breath right in the middle of that phrase and nodded fervently.

“She deserved better,” Y’shtola said, tightening her grip on the arms of her chair until she could concentrate on something useful, which all went straight to the seventh hell when Urianger voicelessly sighed his agreement and sympathy).

It could have been that, could it not? And besides, she knew of stories (in fact, had heard another variation just this morning), twisted accounts of captives developing fondness for captors, and was she not bound in blindness, trapped with _him_?

No. No, as soon as she had the thought, she rejected it. She was not bound by anything other than her word and her will—just yesterday that had been proven: Urianger had no ability to stop her from using aethersight, and seemed to lack any inclination to force otherwise. She had agreed to this and—and her emotions were her own, hers to manage and make sense of, and but lo, now she was squarely back where she had begun this exercise.

(“How many more?” Y’shtola asked Urianger, and didn’t bother to disguise her groan when his immediate response was not a number but a short hum and the sound of flicking page corners. At least he wouldn’t discern any frustration or longing beyond that, she thought. She hoped).

There had to have been some gain to this, to rejecting denial of her childishness. …No, Y’shtola chided herself once again, but now with the type of weariness born of wisdom. What was childish was thinking that simply acknowledging an infatuation (no matter how silly and foolish it was) would make it vanish in a puff of logic. The world wasn’t that simple and more importantly, she was not so lucky.

(Despite Master Matoya’s insinuations that she was lucky to have survived that stunt in the waterway below Ul’dah at all, despite the scar between her breasts left by a monster unaccustomed to leaving survivors at all, despite everything, Y’shtola was not so lucky, she was not some kind of a chosen hero blessed by the star itself—she was only stubborn, unafraid, and _very good_ at what she did, and that was not luck, that wasn’t special, just hard work and force of will, to see it through no matter what it demanded of her—)

“Y’shtola?” Urianger’s voice broke through her reverie, and insistent enough was his tone that she was sure he’d been repeating himself.

“I’m fine,” she said, reflexive and glad she couldn’t see whatever disbelieving expression he must have been making.

He exhaled through his nose, in a way that sounded to her suspiciously like a petty “I wonder,” but instead he said. “Art thou ready?”

“For what?” Her cheeks burned red and she abandoned any hope of escaping this with something like dignity.

“I understand that to be ‘nay’,” Urianger said, and she could hear the sigh in it. “Go on, my lady, for thou must needs rest—”

“No,” Y’shtola interrupted him. “I—Urianger, just—read the last story. The long one.”

This time the sigh was longer, and she heard him closing the book. “Thou art unwell.”

“No I’m not,” Y’shtola said, ignoring how childish simple contradiction felt. “I’m just a little… distracted.”

This time his silence alone felt like a sarcastic rebuke. “May I ask: by what?”

“You may not,” she answered with what she felt was nothing short of plain bravado. “Only read to me.” She licked her lips and tried to seem as serious and focused as possible. “Please. Urianger. I want—” but she cut herself off, unable to permit the risk of trying to finish such a sentence.

“To help?” Urianger, gods damn him, finished it for her, and in such a way that she couldn’t tell him he was wrong. It would be a lie to say he had the full truth, but in a voice softer than starlight, sorrowing in his own way, he had—

“Read to me. I’ll—it’ll help.” Y’shtola didn’t know if it was true, or if she just wanted it to be true enough that it _felt_ true. But she wasn’t going to take it back.

His silence was long enough, and still enough, that she had unfolded her legs to leave before he spoke again. “Very well.” Once again, she heard volume two fall open on the desk. “This last is an Ishgardian tale, from early in the days of the Dragonsong War—before the age of Ishgardian kings was acknowledged past, before an Archbishop ruled in their stead.”

She leaned forward to listen, hands resting on her knees and her toes barely touching the floor, angled pigeon-toed. There had been few stories of this from Ishgard, relatively speaking, which she suspected had been due to the power of Halonic Orthodoxy in the north—but then, a story old enough to precede that force…

“O, all men with ears to hear, all women with hearts to weep, hear now the story of love’s labor gone to naught before Fate’s pitiless reap, hear the story of the Spinner’s twisted lot of two knights and their beloved lady dear: I relate it as best I know, the tragedy of Roxanne, Cedrien, and Cyraneaux.”

And if every other story had been as regular as a metronome, this one broke that rhythm all apart: two men loved one woman, but instead of turning to wickedness and vengeance for his jealousy, the short-eared Cyraneaux aided Cedrien in wooing (as he thought Roxanne could have never loved him for his disfigurement), for he had a clever and eloquent tongue and could compose brilliant poetry—poetry the likes of which (at least, if the collector of the story could be believed) Y’shtola now had the privilege of hearing for herself and as recited by Urianger.

“Twin moons hang above me, shedding white light ‘gainst the midnight sky, twin moons of the Lover, of holiness and beauty the most rarefied,” Urianger said, keeping the meter almost suspiciously well for a first pass at it. This was the introduction to one of the poems that Cyraneaux wrote and told Cedrien to pass off as his own, to woo Roxanne with (for she loved men of erudition and eloquence, which poor Cyraneaux of the maimed ears had in spades, yet handsome Cedrien hadn’t the slightest inclination towards). “Menphina through the heavens flies, Dalamud most loyal follows, between them a space most hallowed, where only the highest do lie: stars nestle between the moons, light between light, night behind night, in these sacred rooms.” How—how _something_ , to listen to a poem meant to aid another, as spoken by yet another—ironic? tragic? Y’shtola could not find the word, she was too busy dwelling on how somehow the staccato “light between light, night behind night” Urianger had made sound wistful and inviting, like a gift given in secret or a dear recollection related. It must have been—

“Clouds ebb and flow, adrift on heavenly tides, between the Lover just so they the zephyrs ride. The twin moons they sweetly cradle, cotton-soft their embrace, softer and darker than the finest sable, how lucky by Fate to be so placed.” It must have been the man’s voice. Something about it, independent of his long training at the Studium, or of the metaphysical, lyrical prophecy under Louisoix, was enough to make her wonder (only half-facetiously) if his grandmother had been a siren. Cyraneaux’s composition was lovely but not flawless, but every lyrical fault or metric stumble of his words vanished on Urianger’s tongue, the steady measure of his breath smoothing out kinks and the depth of his timbre lending a smoky quality to match the night he described—and just then she realized, almost with force enough to jolt her, that there was no way he was reading this poem for the first time, _no one_ was this perfect at recital the very first time, so—

“Yet I swear I’d spurn so heavenly a bed, yet I know a place far softer to rest my head: Let clouds and stars between the moons find sweet rest, I’d rather forever sleep ‘twixt thy breasts.” And he lingered there for a few moments, presumably to allow his audience time to savor the verse before he resumed the prose segment, which Y’shtola was less “savoring” and more growing incredibly conscious of her tail over the seat of her chair, of how she’d locked her ankles together and how her cheeks were probably just splotches of red now. So—that was what it had been leading up to. And now she was no longer wondering if he’d had familiarity but instead she knew, in fact she could picture it perfectly in her mind’s eye:

“You’ve read this to Moenbryda.”

She spoke flatly—without judgment—but the abrupt burst of noise from his desk said otherwise: all at once the chair legs groaned and the feet skidded, something fell to the floor, paper rustled and—oh dear, that was a wet sound. If Y’shtola’d known he’d been taking a sip of his tea, probably she would have waited a moment.

“I—my lady—beg pardon—” Urianger’s voice was hoarse and broken up by coughing. “How—?”

“You read it too well. You already knew it,” she answered, trying not to feel too much satisfaction at getting one over on him when he—ahem. “And who else would you have reason to read it to?”

“I—my lady, understand: I was much younger, and so much a fool…” He trailed off, still hoarse and sounding as genuinely awkward as he had been around when she first met him. Y’shtola could understand why the embarrassment: it was such a perfectly amateur act of seduction, to read poetry comparing the moons to breasts to a woman named _Moenbryda_ —yet the way he had read it seemed to give the lie to the shame he professed: He had read it beautifully, evocative, full of emotion, even lovingly. Not the sort of way she would expect him to read something whose primary association for him was embarrassment—not the way she would expect him to read to _her_ , so…

“I meant nothing ill by it,” Y’shtola said softly, considering herself and him. “Only—I could tell.”

“If I have given offense—”

“No,” Y’shtola said, gently shaking her head. Strange—at once she believed him about the embarrassment and foolishness, yet there was there something more; what she had heard was too passionate for either that excuse or even (she was sure) his usual adoration of verse. It was too easy to picture—so: “Anyroad—please, continue.”

“My lady,” Urianger said as assent, and with only a few seconds to fiddle with pages and clear his throat, he had begun reading again. At first, his voice wavered and even once or twice stumbled, and though it would have fit with the relating of Roxanne’s falling under the spell of Cyraneaux’s verse, Y’shtola rather doubted it was intentional. Soon enough though he regained his confidence, and once again Y’shtola found herself caught up in the story of the knights and their lady, of Cedrien wooing Roxanne with Cyraneaux’s words—until.

“For Fate was never so easily diverted, nor less the capricious and wroth: but a moon ‘fore their troth, the Horde in fury malevolent descended.” Sorrowfully he related the heroic and tragic ends of both Cedrien and Cyraneaux in the attack, gruesomely burned by dragonfire such that their bodies were barely identifiable, much less distinguishable from the other. And, unlike the other stories, and even though she knew it was coming, Y’shtola actually felt the sorrow of the poor, left-behind Roxanne, and had to steel herself for the compounding of tragedy—what unholy tempter would seek her out, what hideous voidsent would she be tricked into allowing entry to the mortal plane?

It was a hedgewitch, as Urianger told it, a witch with knowledge of magic older than black or white, who promised Roxanne she could bring back her one true love if only she had his body for the spell. And Roxanne’s attendants were all the more grieved, for how burned the poor knights had been—but Roxanne herself had neither fear nor doubt, for why would she care for burn scars or silly things like that when his love was so sweet and eloquent? Despite herself Y’shtola wondered if thisstory (which, the part of her that was still distant enough to analyze it could tell, was less a legend or a folk tale and more of a faerie-story) would actually have a happy ending.

Confident in the power of true love, Roxanne brought Cedrien’s body to the witch in secret, and felt the vindication rush through her when the witch’s deep magic agreed whose mortal vessel it had been—and yet. And yet, when the witch cast her spell, no life blossomed, no soul returned. “Bitterly began Roxanne to weep, and then to wail: ‘Traitor! I name thee’ cried she, ‘to rob me after true love’s travail!’ Yet unmoved was the witch, her face like stone: ‘I have fulfilled my part, the error is thine alone. The spell shall return thy true love only—and the man thou hast brought, that is not he.’” With that, Urianger closed the book. “It is done.”

Y’shtola blinked, and realized her mouth was open. “That’s it? It just—ends like that?” Because she could not see if he nodded in agreement, and because the question was rhetorical anyway, and because above all she was the way the way that she was, she continued “That’s just—just a faerie-story. What is it doing in these books?”

Urianger’s voice was calm as he replied. “It is based on real events—the Tragedy of Cyraneaux—but so far lost to the historical record, that children’s faerie-stories, written from plays, themselves written from stories that might have once been about two Ishgardian knights and a baroness, is all that remains to us.”

“Well—well, it’s hardly any use to us, as it is.”

“Perhaps so,” Urianger agreed. “Did thou not enjoy it?”

And she had been the one to ask him to read it—insisting on it, even—she recalled, and swallowed a retort. True—true, though, what she had said when she asked was that she thought it would help. Yet now, if he was asking if she _enjoyed_ it, what did— “I gather you are fond yourself of that faerie-story?” Y’shtola said, half unconsciously.

“I am—not for the reasons thou might believe,” he added hurriedly, and Y’shtola smiled. “I was too young to appreciate its tragedy when first I this tale found, but I have ever been struck by its prophetic spell.” Urianger paused here, and Y’shtola’s mind’s eye, ever unhelpful these days, supplied a wry and wistful smile on his face. “Magic that failed for want of true love? And that could know the difference, besides? Oft and for many hours hath I dwelled upon it.”

“That’s rather unseemly at our ages,” Y’shtola said, on her face her own version of the wistful smile she had imagined on his.

“I doth not believe so,” Urianger replied, “and neither do I believe thou meant those words in earnest, else I would be receiving a tongue-lashing without compare for such wasteful vanity.”

She laughed, for he was mostly right—but ever the tiniest bit wrong, in that when she said she thought that account would help, she had meant help the _cause_ , the _realm_ , but clearly Urianger had interpreted it as help _her_ , and she rarely asked for such a thing—so, to keep the mood off that, without thinking: “If you _want_ a tongue-lashing, all you need do is—”

And abruptly she shut her mouth, hands fisted on her knees pressed together, willing herself not to blush like an embarrassed teenager.

But then, Urianger said “All I would need do is speak of this conversation toanyone at all,” in a tone too perfectly crisp and dry to be spoken with anything _other_ than a shite-eating grin on one’s face and Y’shtola was gone, dissolving into giggles that grew to guffaws, sliding out of the chair to sit on the floor, finally cracking up under the stress and she was sure in her quieter moments she could hear him chuckling along.

_Gods._ Temporary insanity, she thought, a smile on her face and wiping tears from her cheeks.

 

That same light mood lasted through bedtime for her. Y’shtola still didn’t know if she felt this giddy from the strain of work and the state of the realm, or from that silly attraction she had finally decided to stop being in denial about, but neither did she seem to have the wherewithal to sit and seriously ponder the wherefores and how-so’s. Every time she tried—well, it was like Master Matoya trying to keep her in line when she was nine and wanted to be anywhere but neatly lined up, only in her head. …Mostly. Urianger had remarked on how she seemed distracted, a little manic—but, unlike Master Matoya, not disapprovingly, but rather amused—maybe fond? Yes, fond, she was sure.

Rolling over onto her belly, she pushed her face into her pillow and wiggled her shoulders to snuggle further into her blankets. Urianger had wanted to proceed directly into some other collection specifically about voidsent tricking mortals into allowing them a corpse to possess, now that they’d finished the work on resurrection attempts specifically, but he had shelved the idea (and the tome) fairly quickly. Instead, he had reviewed his notes with her help, apparently resigned to her scatterbrained, punch-drunk mood—or, no, “resigned” wasn’t the word for it, which was why Y’shtola was hugging her blankets and pillows with such delighted enthusiasm, and still so high she might’ve suspected accidentally drinking a tincture of gaelicatnip instead of black tea. He’d enjoyed it. It was hard to tell but she quickly found she was growing better at telling, without the use of either her sight or aethersight. His voice would come out quicker, and his accent thicker, than when he offered calm discussion or smooth recitals, and—she still couldn’t imagine him being _casual_ and this was still a silly girlish infatuation but those were things she could further fret over tomorrow. After all, it was too late to do anything but sleep for now.

It didn’t take long for sleep to find her that night—and only slightly longer for her dreams to take shape. Tonight, she had company in the form of her mental conjuring of Urianger—and it was immediately apparent that she dreamt him; for in her dreams he did not speak as he normally would… nor, honestly, as _anyone_ normally would. Evidently her dreams were not up to the task of mimicking his style of diction, for every time he opened his mouth no words came out but the sound of his voice and a rush of _feeling_. Hers, not his, as if in a dream that voice could bypass words and language and comprehension itself, and be distilled into solely sound and her reaction to it. Cause and effect in dream logic were unsteady things, only connected by the frailest of threads—around him swirled unreality, a strange blending of Matoya’s cave and the Studium and the Rising Stones and the Waking Sands, places and people that came to exist as she recalled them and faded as she forgot, but he and _his voice_ constituted the constant presence, the cause whose effect she knew with certainty. With all words dissolved to sounds, he spoke to her in her recollection of his musing hums, a hoarse and sandpapered chuckle—a pleading tone that rose straight along his throat, a groan that rasped its way past his lips, the vibrations of his timbre all-encompassing, all-enveloping in her dreams. Cause and effect in dreams were connected by only the most tenuous of strings—when he spoke, when he plucked those strings, she thrummed in response.

It ended too soon, as such dreams always do, and Y’shtola awoke curled into a tight ball, panting into her pillow. Blinking, she conjured aethersight for only a moment—only long enough to see that yes, it was enough on her mind for _him_ to appear, on the bed with her—before she squeezed her eyes shutand snuffed the aether out again, pulling her blankets up over her head. It was quite some time before she rose from bed properly.


	6. Chapter 6

By the time she made her way downstairs, last night’s slap-happy giddiness was long gone. In its stead, she was finding her emotions now easy to master and transmute into a sort of serene confidence—like her usual bearing, but better, more perfected: if last night she had flown high above the earth, now she stood tall atop and astride it. Yesterday morning she had been curt with her fellow Scions, prickly even, but today nothing could disrupt her good humor, complimenting Tataru on the soft feel of the yarn she’d chosen and getting into a spirited discussion with Ocher on the use of water-element technique in non-combat conjury. And so, when she came down to see Urianger, it was with so contented a smile that even he commented on it.

“But three days ago, thou wert ready to seek vengeance ‘pon me, yet now…” He trailed off, and Y’shtola took his hand to be led as if it were the most natural thing (though the corners of her smile curled in as she did, secretly pleased).

“Well, you’ve let me have my research after all,” Y’shtola returned, “so I hardly see the need anymore.” And it was true—not the whole, but true.

“So I did. Yet forget not, lady, that ‘neath these days lay this intent: that thou allow thyself rest, and replenish thy strength, thy aether.” He paused, and Y’shtola thought she heard him swallow before he continued. “I would not see thou diminish further.”

Now her fond smile twisted rueful. “Urianger, really. I appreciate your concern, but I am doing just fine.” By now she had memorized the number of steps and the feel of their length between the opening-up of the archive shelves and “her” chair, so she was quick to relinquish his hand and sit herself primly down, tail swishing in anticipation. “So—Voidsent today, yes?”

“Indeed,” he said, his own chair creaking as he settled into it—but it was not accompanied by the scuffing and rustling sound of him retrieving and opening his tomes. “But my lady—I yet worry on thy state and thy aether, after last night.” He hesitated. “I hath not Krile’s gifts nor the extent of her vision, yet, still to me, thy aether be not at peace and hath been turbulent since yesterday. Art thou certain—”

“I am,” Y’shtola said, a little more defensively than she would have liked. Urianger had no great gifts from the Mothercrystal, nor had he delved into aethersight as she had, but his own aetheric strength was significant—even if he spent it all in pursuit of prophecy, she was remiss to forget how sharp his perception was. “I’m—I know what it seemed like, but I promise you, Urianger, that nothing is wrong.”

“Then this care doth replenish thy wellspring mortal and aetheric alike?”

Ah. There it was, then, the disadvantage of hiding the full truth. But, Y’shtola thought, now honestly bristling, that tack was not terribly fair of him to try, and a fairly obvious attempt to catch out what she was hiding. “My health is my prerogative, Urianger, and I promised you a week of rest. That’s all,” she said sharply, ears flatter and turned to the side.

She must have won, at least, for he only sighed in that sad and ragged and lovely way he had, then she heard the telltale sound of books moving, being opened. “‘On the manners and forms taken by the Voidsent upon their entry to our world’…”

This subject was one where she knew mostly by field experience rather than recorded accounts and research, and so to hear the forms taken by such accounts of encounters with them was a strange sort of novelty. More than once she interrupted Urianger to offer corrections, amendments, or assertions that the source was flat-out lying, and only about half the time did he in turn caution her that they were not the only or ultimate authorities on these matters. There was something of value to be learned here, even for experts like he and she.

“Yes, but this man is _obviously_ wrong if not lying,” Y’shtola said, gesturing helpfully as she spoke. “He says ahrimans and bats cannot have a connection due to bats being blind, which is blatantly false. Even the bats that _are_ blind _still_ have eyes, and that’s all such a voidsent needs to gain entry and then incubate. And if he’s so clueless about something so basic, how can he be trusted on other matters?”

“Ignorance of bats is not so rare an error as my lady presumes,” Urianger argued in his turn, “and methinks it doth not necessarily indicate a universal stupidity.”

“When this story is about an ahriman, I think it does.” Y’shtola crossed her arms, one eyebrow raised.

“It contains an ahriman,” he said, stressing words to accentuate the difference he perceived there. “There’s mention of tauri, succubi, and voidsent still more foul, and no error in their descriptions did I discern.”

“He’s still wrong and it’s made it the harder to take him at his word.”

“Then don’t, my lady,” Urianger said, “but at least let me finish the reading without further interruption?”

“Fine, fine,” Y’shtola muttered, resting her chin in one palm, resigned to her annoyance. There would be a full airing of grievances, she planned, the moment Urianger finished the story—her fingertips counting over the stitches and the hardanger gaps between, one for every error that she noticed in this particular fool’s story.

Yet even as she did, she felt her moodiness begin to fade (even as she tried to hold on)—the story Urianger told was indeed the words of a fool who barely knew if a chocobo was feathered or a moogle pommed, but despite that she began to feel for his genuine good intentions. He was a rich dunesfolk boy, from south of the Shroud—rich enough to have never been closer to a beastkin or cloudkin than his pets or his dinner table, and thus all the more a fool for not taking advantage of the sort of education his mother could buy—but all he wanted was genuine friendship, it seemed. Unfortunately, while his silly “disguises” did seem to win him some real friends among the common class, they made him an unwitting target for all manner of unsavory predators. The worst of the lot was the cleverest, a voidmage who recognized that the naive, disguised rich boy could lead him to a plethora of people whose disappearance would not overly concern peacekeepers in Ul’dah: the boy’s genuine friends. And when the boy realized what his stupidity had led to—the true nature of the “menagerie” his “friend” had been collecting… well, there was one bit of good news about it, which was that _his_ word would stir the Brass Blades to finally act, which was why he’d survived long enough to pen his factual-error-riddled tale of woe.

A fool, yes, but a repentant one, and Y’shtola couldn’t quite bring herself to rip into his mistakes with the vigor she had earlier. “What became of him?” was all she said, short and clipped.

“Brother Kikiloro gave to their families his share of the family’s fortune, and joined a monastery, on whose grounds he lived the rest of his days,” Urianger said, over the sound of a turned page. “He wrote many treatises on ethical matters, most of which received mixed responses, as well as the accounting of that tragedy.”

“‘Mixed responses’ sounds right,” Y’shtola muttered. “I can’t decide what I think of him, or his story.”

“Thou did say before that trust in his words was beyond thee,” Urianger said mildly.

“That’s different. He caused so much suffering, yet…” She ran her fingers through her bangs, pushing them up and away from her eyes. “He was just an idiot, and nothing he could do would compensate families for lives lost to his foolishness. But—” She sighed so vigorously her hair fell back to where it was before. “But he was just an idiot.”

“I wouldst say the _cause_ of suffering were not Kikiloro, but the malevolent force that used him.” There was a strange urgency in Urianger’s voice—and, her ears could pinpoint, it came from a position very slightly different, as though he had leaned towards… her? yes… greatly. “He did all that he knew to do.”

“He should’ve known better,” Y’shtola said, flatly and more sourly than she had meant to. “Nothing can make up for—for that…” Words failed her; all she could think was to quote back to Urianger what he’d read aloud, the remorsefully descriptive accounts of what each person had become from their voidsent possession, the self-flagellation clear in every adjective.

“I believe Brother Kikiloro understood as much, else he would never have taken the habit.” Urianger said, softly. “Some things we have no choice but live through, as best we can. What else wouldst thou have him do?” Again there was that strange echo of grief in his voice—like when he had told the tragedy of the twisted Mhachi family, as if he felt the losses of those a millennium dead as keenly as they were his own—

“I don’t know,” Y’shtola said, discontented with all of them—herself, Urianger, the ghost of Kikiloro and whatever of his story that was the honest truth. “More.” Urianger sighed at her, very quiet. “Anyroad—anyroad, I suppose we ought to move on. Just one thing first,” Her mouth formed a smile meant to be both wry and amused, trying to fake the feeling until she actually felt the mood lighten. “Only—after _that_ , only promise me you won’t let a voidmage anywhere near my body after I die.” Macabre humor, yes, but still, she thought it a decent start.

Except that instead of his groan of acknowledgment of a bad joke, he snapped the tome shut. “My lady,” Urianger said, through his teeth, “whence cometh thy certainty that I shall outlive thee by long enough?”

“What?” Caught wrongfooted, this was all that Y’shtola could think to say.

“Th’art convinced I shall bury thee, that Fate hath no design where thou livest long enough to age.” There was—biting anger in his voice, and the part of Y’shtola not caught totally off-guard wondered at the last time she’d actually heard him angry. Whenever it was, it wasn’t recently.

“Urianger, I—it was a joke,” she said, mentally grasping for a real response.

“Was it?” His anger was not defused, and Y’shtola felt her own rise to match. She was, after all, provoked. He was— “What is _funny_ about it, then?”

Urianger had a point, which finally made Y’shtola angry enough to lash back. “Perhaps nothing—but why are _you_ so angry at me for it?” Her hands were clenched around the ends of the chair-arms, tight enough to feel the strain of the fabric pulled against its brads.

“It is sorrow and rage,” Urianger ground out, each syllable crushed flat and rusty, “to hold another’s life more sacred than she does.”

Y’shtola made a wordless sound of frustration. Of course that was what this was about, this was always what everything was about. “I’m a woman grown, Urianger, I make my own decisions and keep my own priorities.” Fury swelled in her at his presumptiveness—nowhere near old enough to be her father, what entitled him to think he knew better than she?

“So thou dost.” Each word was spat out. “Didst thou ever consider _once_ allowing thyself life with us, not given for us?”

She snapped.

“How _dare_ you!” Standing from her chair, fists clenched, Y’shtola felt her aether swirl with her emotions. “How dare you belittle the sacrifices made for the cause, for the realm in her entirety—” She paused to suck in an unsteady breath, and he seized the opportunity.

“ _Thou_ speakest of the past! _I_ am the one concerned with the future! Mine, thine, ours—” Y’shtola chortled breathlessly, humorlessly, scornfully at him, but he raised his voice over hers. “Thou hast no regard for thy life but as a weapon, yet thou wouldst dare accuse _me_ of dishonoring past sacrifices—!”

“I say it because you do! You do live in the past! It’s already—” She clenched her fists tighter, tail prickling and trembling. “It’s already decided, what I must—”

“It is _not_.” Urianger sounded desperate in his anger—both in holding on to it and in another way, a— “ _Thou_ hast decided, thou may yet decide again, thou still hast time—”

He cut himself off when Y’shtola looked at him, her pale eyes focused on him so precisely as to give the lie to her blindness. Through aether, she saw him, the low lights of the archives searing red and yellow and in its shadows the purple shades of Ascian magic and Matoya’s disapproval in her back turned and Urianger himself, his dark robes cloaking him and his godsdamned hidden face—

“Why can’t you accept it?” Though the words alone were plaintive, she spoke to him with the same desperate anger he had shown her, and her reward was to see the bitter recognition in how he grimaced at her, head tilted as though he could no longer quite look her in the eyes. “Why can’t you— _I_ made my peace long ago, for the good of the realm, so _why_ can’t you let me choose, why do you _do_ this?!”

“I could not allow—” He was shaking his head now, and what glimpses she could catch of his face had his lips curled and twisted. “There is another way, and I could not—”

“ _No_.” She could feel the throbbing of her beating heart, hear it in her ears and _see_ it in the trembling of light and aether. “I’m not your child, Urianger, you can’t decide for me—”

He mirrored her humorless and despairing chortle, mixed with a long-suffering sigh. “If in sooth thou believeth my affection fatherly, th’art more the fool than I had dreamt—”

“Gods damn you, Urianger!” The indignant hate she felt and voiced could have (and maybe did) rattle the shelves around them. “Damn you, I’m _trying to_ —I _want_ to save your ungrateful hide, and all you do is—is—” Her anger hadn’t burnt out—it was near an animating force—but perhaps it was her body that simply no longer had the means to channel it correctly.

“All I do is try to save thine own ungrateful hide.” The words could have been plaintive (and, perhaps, on some level, they were) but his voice was full of bitter desperation. “Y’shtola, please: Too many times already hath I lost days, weeks, moons to seeking the pieces of my heart, and already do I know I shall not find them all again in this lifetime. I—not again. I cannot do it again.” Each word sounded like a barbed fishhook, pulled free of his throat only with agony.

At once she was moved—and yet. And yet, no matter what she did, even if she only did as he wished—”Some things we have no choice but to live through,” Y’shtola recited, cold where he had been warm and determined as he had been. “What else would you have me do?”

When first she had thrown his words in his face, Urianger had looked stricken—but only moments later his expression resolved into something to match hers, and where he might have lacked in expression, the body language of an elezen man, more than a fulm taller than her, was more imposing than she could dream of being, towering over her. “If I knew not the truth, it would be easy to believe thou the stone-heart with neither ruth nor feeling, only reason and selfishness.”

More than a fulm taller than her was intimidating, was physically challenging, but not so much that she could not slap him.

He did not move his head back, instead she was faced with the reddening of her handprint over his fair skin, and the silence between them after was only broken by the soft rustling of his goggles slipping the rest of the way off his face and clattering to the floor. “How _dare_ you,” Y’shtola hissed again. Her hand stung ferociously from the force she had struck him with; she curled it into a fist.

Urianger didn’t answer her, but he did finally turn back to face her, mouth set in a stubborn, angry line and eyes shining with emotion. All he did was stare her down, and Y’shtola didn’t blink, but she did spin on her heel and storm out of the archives, and over the sound of the paper rustling in her wake she heard his footsteps, retreating, then from deeper in still she heard a door slam before her turn up the stairs, back into the daylight and the crowd of the Rising Stones proper.


	7. Chapter 7

Apparently her dramatic entrance had been all the warning the others needed to leave her alone for the rest of that day, which well suited her. By late afternoon, some pricklings of doubt and regret had begun to appear, but she simply pushed them further down to smother them. Even if she had been a little spiteful, Urianger needed to accept what she had almost a year ago.

Nestled in a corner of her room, spending the evening with her notes and tea with extra milk and honey, in a lovely soft quietude, neither too hot nor too cold, Y’shtola still found herself unable to concentrate. Instead of considering notes from the incident with Leviathan, with his body-hopping sahagin priest, she found herself reliving _that_ moment—not the one when Kan-E-Senna had drawn her from the Lifestream, but the one immediately following. The one where she had opened her eyes and nothing changed.

Probably if she had asked Kan-E-Senna or the Warrior (or Alphinaud, though she’d prefer not to ask _him_ ), they would not recall her as panicky in those moments, returned to the world of things like flesh, gravity, seasons and sunlight. And she was proud of how quickly and efficiently she had handled that situation: She couldn’t see. It wasn’t rectifying itself with blinking or rubbing at her eyes. But she knew how to simulate sight with aether, had learned the technique from a book she’d boldly “borrowed” from Matoya’s library years and years ago. There were drawbacks, she remembered from skimming that section very hurriedly, but the biggest one she recalled (synchronizing and matching so that she wasn’t giving herself a headache by constant double-vision) would not be an issue. So she had wrestled her aether into place, lit it like a match, and spent that day in Gridania refining the technique, re-learning how it worked.

She didn’t spare a thought to the cost in years off her lifespan until that night, after the sun had gone down.

And even then, the decision had been easy to make. Plenty had been the moments during her brief recuperation where she had accidentally extinguished the aethersight, or was too weary to manage it correctly or at all, and she was confronted once again with her newfound blindness, and how it made tasks that had only taken her the barest effort into major undertakings, and how long it took her to accomplish even simple things, and that was enough for her to know. The realm needed her too urgently for her to relearn everything—she might as well just jump straight back into the Lifestream as relearn everything without vision, as force everyone else to waste precious time learning with her. No, this was the only real option, and if it killed her years early? That would only mean it did what Garlemald, the Syndicate, an assortment of bandits, villains, beastmen, and every known primal had failed to do.

She could not give herself the luxury of time when the realm entire was running on it borrowed. Y’shtola made her choice, the only responsible one she could make.

And that _Urianger couldn’t see that_ made her so angry she could barely speak. That he had called her _selfish_ —

The sound of paper tearing jarred her from introspection—apparently just thinking on it made her hands shake violently enough to half-tear a leaf from its folio. Chagrined, Y’shtola put it down for a moment, instead looking to her trembling fingers. When they didn’t steady, she curled them into fists—but then, though to her sight they were still, now the tremors were things she felt, reverberating from her wrists almost all the way up to her arms, and when no amount of increasing the discipline, the tension made them dissipate at all, she released her hands with a disgusted sigh. Drawing her knees up to her chin, wrapping her tail around her feet, she sat with her eyes closed (and aethersight blacked out) and drummed her fingertips against her shins. She was wearing older clothes now, a green blouse and loose white trousers, and she focused on the feeling of the fabric under her fingertips, on the perfect regularity of the weave (pulling out pilling strands if she found them). It was… soothing, and something to think about other than Urianger, other than her anger and even worse, her imperfect mastery of it—something other than maintaining aethersight, other than the work she couldn’t make herself do, other than the lateness of the hour and the sinking of the sun and the only responsible choice she could possibly make.

Y’shtola had no fear of death. Having no fear of death is a very difficult thing to maintain, and took almost as much work as keeping aethersight alive, which was the sort of ironic thing she didn’t let herself think about much. She worked hard to be this fearless, and then—and then _Urianger_ with his misplaced good intentions… the choice she’d made was hard enough without his presence, without his seditious words and his pleading voice…

Just then, she realized what she was doing—with eyes closed, concentrating on the feel of fabric under her fingertips, to calm and to center herself—was something she’d learned _because of him_ and she almost screamed into the crook of her elbow. _Gods above_ , save her from foolish good intentions.

 

When she finally allowed herself to go to bed that night, it had been with the hope that the morning would be somehow better. It was not.

It was a beautiful, sunshiney morning, and birdsong could be heard from outside, and when she dragged herself downstairs Alianne was enthusiastically talking about how some of her plants had finally blossomed, and Y’shtola almost turned straight around and went straight back to bed. She didn’t need this. Right now, she really— _really_ —didn’t need the world to be lovely. She needed it to be bleak and sorrowing and with hope thin on the ground (but _not_ absent, that was important)—except that when she flung herself into the sort of research that would lend her that impression, all it did now was remind her of staying in the stacks with Urianger. Was that part of his plan? She had to admit, she thought as she forcefully reshelved the tomes, if it was he was cleverer than she gave him credit for, or at least better than she at plotting for the long-term.

So, with nothing better to do and needing much better than _nothing_ to do, when Hoary Boulder and Coultenet asked her if she would join them for a session of combat training, she near leapt at the chance. Something useful and immediately beneficial, with no connection at all to Urianger: perfect.

“I’ve got a few new tricks up my sleeve,” Hoary had said, in that near-embarrassed near-smiling way most humble men have when not even they can minimize extraordinary skill or talent anymore. They’d take two teams: Herself and Hoary on the one, Coultenet on the second, primed to utilize his thaumaturgy to its best effect, while—if all went as planned—Hoary would employ said new tricks to receive nary a singed eyebrow from the magic.

“You’re sure you can handle this?” Y’shtola had directed that question not at Hoary but at Coultenet. The two of them were rarely separated and even less often in opposition to each other, even at practice like this—could he be ruthless enough to _truly_ test his partner?

“I’m sure,” Coultenet said, while Hoary laughed amiably.

“He’ll just remember how I snore,” he joked, stretching the shoulder of his sword arm as he stepped in front of Y’shtola—and standing so much taller than her, that his shield obscured much of her view of the “battlefield.”

“On the count of three,” Coultenet called from beyond Hoary’s shield. “One—two—”

She started before three, because battles usually did. Wrapping a person in protective aether was by now something she could do in her sleep, and long before Coultenet could finish a cast. Compelling aether to release curative energies not at once but in a staggered way was another trick she’d mastered before adolescence, as was exploiting the characteristic properties of earth-aspected aether to form magical barriers, and it was with no small amount of satisfaction that she watched Coultenet’s fire and lightning rendered near impotent before them.

“Did it work?” Coultenet called out, panting a little from the exertion of thaumaturgy—no surprise after the barrage he had unleashed, Y’shtola thought.

Only—Hoary hesitated. “I’m… I’m not precisely sure.”

“What?” Coultenet and Y’shtola said in unison.

“I couldn’t feel a thing, but—beggin’ your lady’s pardon, but I’m not sure whether that was my doin’, or yours.” Hoary paused a few times as he spoke, his embarrassment clearly audible.

“Perhaps you could restrain yourself, Lady Y’shtola?” Coultenet offered, and she felt a slight blush rise to her cheeks.

“Very well,” she agreed calmly, her tail curling around her leg as she tried to keep it from betraying too much emotion for a minor error at training.

After a few moments for Coultenet to ready himself again, Y’shtola very deliberately kept her staff lowered—at the ready, in the case of mishaps or error, but not involved _yet_ , even though her fingers on it gripped tightly to keep it that way. Aethersight was even better than her normal vision for understanding the flow of magical combat: Coultenet was a skilled and powerful thaumaturge whose aether swelled and glowed almost enough to dwarf his physical body, were his limbs any shorter and his precision any less perfect. By contrast, Hoary’s aetheric technique… needed work. It wasn’t often that soldiers with swords and shields made much conscious use of their aether; exercises that most disciples of magic would consider basic constituted an advanced mastery for them. So, if Y’shtola were inclined to be fair, by the standards of Hoary’s colleagues his control of aether was exceptional.

Instead she just tightened both her grip on her staff and her grimace, watching Hoary’s motions and his aether more attentively than a hunting hawk. And when he finally faltered, she forced herself to wait until an actually pained gasp left him to act, practically dousing him in curative aether until Coultenet at last ended his barrage, sweating and panting with his hands on his knees.

“Better?” Y’shtola called to both of them.

“I think so,” Hoary said, more cheerily than before. “The business with the aether and the shield at once is trickier than it seems!”

“Good, good,” Coultenet said, still sounding winded but less like he was about to fall over (that he no longer radiated heat like an oven but a soothing aetheric coolness instead was probably helping). “Again?”

“Well—” Hoary glanced over his shoulder briefly, “Let’s try a different method? I don’t think Lady Y’shtola has Clemence’s patience.” He meant it affectionately, so she laughed, but her tail still curled in slow lashes.

The training Hoary had in mind, though, was more than strenuous enough to put not only the prior attempt but all her worries from her mind—and if she had brainpower enough to be grateful, she would’ve been. Instead, by the time he’d finished she’d flopped over onto the ground right next to where Coultenet, exhausted, was spread-eagled on his back.

“If I wanted—to run—” he muttered, through pained gasps, “I’d have—taken up—the bow.” Y’shtola couldn’t quite get the air to answer, but hoped that her guttural _whuff_! of expelled breath was communicative enough. Bloody _gladiators_.

“Lunch break?” Hoary asked the two of them, sounding only slightly out of breath (damn him). And though her stomach lurched further at the thought of food—

“If it comes with water,” Y’shtola groaned, wiping her hairline with disgust. Hoary laughed—then the next thing she knew, she was being lifted into the air, coming to rest on one of Hoary’s broad shoulders. A moment later, Coultenet was slung over his other shoulder, and he was marching back to the Rising Stones proper.

“Show-off,” Coultenet grumbled, and Y’shtola agreed.

 

Back at the Rising Stones, at least, there was plenty of water—not just for drinking but rinsing out her hair before the objectionable smell settled in to stay. There was no sign of Urianger, and guilt warred with her internal belligerence when she’d noticed she had noticed. Once again, she pushed it from her mind and instead focused herself on the task at hand—that is, a light lunch with an ebullient and talkative Tataru.

Probably she knew something of what had happened between her and Urianger, Y’shtola thought, for one because she had the good sense not to breathe a word about the man, nor even that she hadn’t expected to see Y’shtola around today. Instead, Tataru was full of conversation about Alianne’s flowers and Riol’s latest letter and where on earth did Alisaie wander off to this morning and unlike the morning, now Y’shtola was in a perfectly receptive mood for most of it. Perhaps a bit too wearied to offer deep responses, yes, but Tataru never minded that sort of thing. Being heard seemed to be enough for her, some days—probably a by-product of having to manage some of the realm’s most colorful personalities day in and day out, honestly. With one final and wholly unsubtle hint that she was almost done with Y’shtola’s sweater, Tataru excused herself, and Y’shtola thought it was about time to see if Hoary and Coultenet were ready for another round, before her mind could settle back to thoughts she’d rather not entertain.

Not only were they ready, but they’d cajoled Aenor into joining them as well, and she’d had the idea of rotating two-on-two mock battles, which had met with great enthusiasm from the two men of their little group, such that Y’shtola was pleased to assent to that plan as well. And, like Tataru, Aenor gave no hint of knowledge that anything might have gone badly between her and Urianger such that Y’shtola again concluded that she had figured it out quite neatly (perhaps their argument had been… louder than Y’shtola realized at the time). Despite this, Aenor was the model of discretion, much to Y’shtola’s impressed surprise, and so she felt no qualms about drawing her as her partner for the first sparring match.

“Winner gets Hoary?” Aenor called over to the opposing team as they stretched—in her playful, fake-sultry tone, which was met with the laughter Y’shtola thought it properly merited (as well as a rude gesture from Coultenet, which may have been less merited).

“I’m not sure I _want_ to win after that,” Y’shtola remarked, to which Aenor only laughed cheerfully. And indeed they didn’t win that little bout—Hoary and Coultenet were a practiced and therefore nigh-unstoppable team—but the next shake-up, herself and Coultenet versus Aenor and Hoary, was an easy victory, and so was the rematch of it Hoary demanded.

Flying high and confident, Y’shtola agreed with Coultenet that best three out of five was ridiculous, and changed places with Aenor: Final bout, herself and Hoary Boulder against Aenor and Coultenet. And even though she was perfectly aware this was just practice verging dangerously close to play, she was approaching the strategizing as analytically as though they were deadly serious. Confidence aside, she was aware that all of them were tiring by now, Aenor and Hoary probably most of all (Coultenet seemed as buoyed by his unbroken winning streak as he was by the lull/high nature of combat thaumaturgy). As well, she was painfully aware that she’d be the primary target of both an archer and a thaumaturge (they’d need to be fools to prioritize otherwise, and neither of them were), which made both the risk of error and of loss sky-high and thrilling. But she could handle it. It’d be hard-fought, but she knew she could win.

And she was right about it being hard-fought. Aenor was nimble and Coultenet was clever and between them they had skills to bedevil Hoary to near-madness—what she had expected to end swiftly in a blazing offensive instead began to drag out, Hoary stubbornly refusing to give any ground and she too occupied with keeping restorative aether flowing freely around the both of them to take any of the opportunities to knock either the archer or the thaumaturge down. In fact, she wryly thought, it seemed most like the victory would go to whoever knew the terrain best—whoever would show the other that their hiding space was not so secure as they thought.

And just right now, that person was looking to be her. Coultenet had his hands full trying to flee an exceptionally tenacious Hoary Boulder, and didn’t seem to have taken into account he was fleeing directly into her range and line of sight—just one simple cast combined with Hoary’s onslaught would mark a turning point.

She didn’t start willing the aether into the shape of stone a moment too soon, either: a shift in the aether warned her Aenor had seen—no, _sighted_ her—and if Hoary was busy getting the upper hand on Coultenet, then she had her shot and Y’shtola knew she wasn’t fool enough to throw it away. Even so—the choice was clear: even if her aim was true, she wouldn’t be fast enough to stop the cast, and between Hoary’s relentless assault and earth aether from his blind side, Coultenet would be downed.

It took her less than a thousandth of a second to dispel her doubt and decide. At the very last moment, as the stone materialized, Y’shtola shut her eyes to brace for the incoming hit. …The hit that never came.

Instead, once again she was scooped up by Hoary Boulder, now gaping in horror as he left Coultenet to recover in order to put himself between her and Aenor, literally covering her with his body—

“What are you _doing_ —” Y’shtola managed to say, before the all-out offensive she had first predicted came out with a vengeance.

“Do you yield?” came Aenor’s voice afterwards, not playful but perfectly professional.

Y’shtola didn’t answer her. “Why?” she asked Hoary, plaintive and confused—then repeated it even though she could tell he only delayed due to coughing in the churned-up sand.

“Why what?” He seemed as honestly perplexed as she was.

“Why did you do that?” That was their opportunity to win—the best one they’d had and maybe the last one they’d have gotten, and if only Hoary Boulder had stayed on target, had kept Coultenet down, he could have taken them to victory, could have—

“Begging your pardon, Lady Y’shtola, but it’s my job to keep you alive n’ kicking.”

He delivered it with a chuckle and a broad grin, easily and confidently, as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. Almost immediately, Y’shtola felt her throat close and tears well in her eyes, in a way she couldn’t attribute to the dusty air around them but wasn’t sure what to attribute to at all.

“Do you yield?” Aenor again, more insistent this time.

“I—” Y’shtola began before she had to pause, swallow a lump to keep her composure (and Hoary’s expression was quickly becoming worried, which made it _worse_ ). “I—It’s _my_ job to keep _you_ safe.” Why was she choking back tears? Ashamed, she cast her gaze to the ground between her legs, dusting up her white tail.

“Lady Y’shtola… er…” Hoary seemed to be at a loss for words, and shortly after he trailed off she heard footsteps near them—the briefest glance, as long as she dared, showed it to be Aenor and Coultenet, presumably here to check on them after their failure to respond.

“Do you yield?” Aenor, a third time, but this time sounding hesitant and uncertain, almost shy, and Y’shtola burst into tears.

All three of the others spoke their dismay immediately, Coultenet the most clearly: “Oh! Are you hurt? Lady Y’shtola, I’m so sorry, I—”

“No!” Y’shtola said loudly, angrily. “I’m fine—I’m fine and I shouldn’t be! Hoary—” She turned back to him, the Roegadyn looking entirely baffled and concerned, “Hoary— _why_ —”

“Hoary, what did you do?” Aenor’s voice was firm, she crossed her arms over her chest.

“Covered her,” he said, obviously bewildered. “I don’t know what—”

“I knew what I was doing!” Y’shtola was almost shouting. “I knew how we would win, and I—I…” She trailed off again, in part to stifle a hiccup (she may have been crying in the dirt after losing a sparring bout but that only made what remained of her dignity even more important)… but also because she suddenly didn’t know how to finish that sentence. She’d already said she knew what she was doing. She’d already said that she was fine. “I made the decision, and—”

“Is this because you lost…?” Coultenet said slowly, sounding incredulous, and Y’shtola’s anger was stoked anew.

“I don’t care about that!” They probably wouldn’t believe her given that delivery, but she didn’t care. “I—I chose to take the hit. And then—” she swallowed again. “And then he didn’t let me.”

They were silent, and the silence quickly grew awkward. Hoary Boulder was still looking away from her, but Y’shtola could feel two other pairs of eyes studying her carefully. “If you’re this upset because you think he threw—”

“No—” This time it wasn’t Y’shtola’s voice interrupting Coultenet, but Aenor. “No, that’s not it. …Lady Y’shtola—” here she knelt down next to her, one hand reaching out to pat her shoulder, “what’s troubling you?”

She snorted a bit in rueful, ironic laughter. “So much,” Y’shtola began, and opened her mouth to begin—except nothing came out. “I—” Once again, she tried to explain, tried to make her mouth form words about how she had a good reason for it, how it was necessary for the greater good, how she made her own choices, how—

—How of course this was what she was inconsolable about, this was always what everything was about.

“I yield,” she whispered, and let Aenor pat her shoulder.


	8. Chapter 8

At the very least, there were no more questions from Coultenet or Hoary Boulder. Y’shtola had made herself—”presentable” was a strong word, but she got herself into a condition where she would consent to let them escort her back to the Rising Stones, and even let someone of them rest one hand on her arm periodically. And once they were inside, Y’shtola very obviously fled back to her quarters (“The stress got to her,” Hoary not-quite-lied, for which she would owe him immensely) before anyone could get too long a look at her. Gods, she was a _mess_. Dust and dirt in her clothes and her hair and her fur, scraped and bruised, and her face was simply disgraceful—she couldn’t even wait for her bathtub to fill halfway before she stripped and climbed in, clothes left strewn over the floor. Immediately she bent to cup water in her hands and splash it over her face, then scrub at her cheeks, her nose, her eyes, until when she looked at her hands her knuckles and joints were reddened and her skin felt scraped and stretched from it. Sighing, she settled down into the bath, enduring the chilly drafts around her back as penance for her impatience, and blankly watched it fill… thinking.

Not thinking about anything important—just how the water rippled, how wavy and distorted what was beneath the water’s surface looked, how it was finally starting to heat her through to her core like it was supposed to, when she thought she should shut off the hot water flow. That was all. That was enough. If she could just stay like this forever, it would be enough.

But no sooner had she thought such as she felt guilt creeping in the back of her mind—and immediately followed by frustration, then anger, then—

“Y’shtola?” Tataru’s voice, accompanying a brisk knocking on her door. “Dearie, are you well?”

“I’m in the bath,” she replied, carefully pitching her voice to be heard through two doors, but no further.

“Oh, good. I’ll just—” To Y’shtola’s surprise, she heard one latch unfasten and hinge creak: Tataru must be letting herself in… to her rooms? “I’m sorry, dear, only I have a few things for you.”

“…I might be a while, I haven’t washed my hair yet.” Y’shtola actually hadn’t washed any of her properly, with soap, and nor was she acting to rectify it—just sinking deeper into the hot water, occasionally glancing at the soap with a sort of lazy consideration.

“Oh, that’s fine, dear,” Tataru was now definitely in her room. “I’ll just leave them for you.”

“Thank you.” This was followed by a long, mostly-comfortable silence for Y’shtola, one that, significantly, didn’t include the sounds of any latches or hinges.

“…Y’shtola,” Tataru said, and maybe it was the distortion of their separation or simply Y’shtola’s imagination, but she sounded, somehow, worried. “Would you mind if I… tidied up a bit?”

Another silence ensued, this one brief—Y’shtola this time looking at the door with that same kind of consideration. “Go ahead.”

Almost immediately, she heard Tataru get moving, in her familiar bustling way. “Don’t worry, I shan’t peer or snoop! I’ll just clean these surfaces… gather this laundry…” She trailed off into silence again, and Y’shtola sighed softly, not that she expected Tataru to hear it.

“Thank you.” While she did expect that Tataru heard it, she was comfortable still with the silence between them then. They’d known each other a long time, long enough for Y’shtola to know how seriously Tataru took her role. In fact, she found it more than a little ironic how determined Tataru was to take care of all of them—Tataru, a clerk and secretary with no martial or magical training, let alone prowess, was so protective of a crew of the most capable, most highly-trained, most dangerous if it came to it people in all the realm…

Gods, and she was even _singing_ while she did it, Y’shtola realized, brow knitting with anxious fondness as she watched the door. Quietly, without consistent meter or tune, nor words at all, but she was still singing while she did it and that’s what mattered.

“None of you make this easy,” Y’shtola said, quietly, resting her head back against the side of the bathtub. She didn’t expect Tataru to have heard.

“Make what easy?” Once again, her voice was that gentle worried tone, and Y’shtola’s tail curled around her, a self-conscious gesture. Tataru would’ve had the right to indignation, but…

She closed her eyes, and lowered the light of aethersight, until all that was clearly visible anymore was the light reflected on the surface of her bath, and what it could dimly illuminate: the water, the tub, herself, and her reflection. “What I must do.” No, that wasn’t clear enough. There was so much work she needed to do… “For the good of the realm.”

And she planned to say more, once she figured out how to say it, how to make it into words, even with a door between her and her audience, but Tataru spoke first, beginning with a sigh. “Dearie, that’s my line.”

“—Hm?” Y’shtola was momentarily so startled, everything returned to sharp focus. Out of all the things Tataru could have said to that…

“I’ve welcomed every person who ever crossed our threshold—you included—and so many have compared to—to how many we have now.” Her words were punctuated by a steady, perfectly metered _swoosh_ ing sound, probably a feather duster or the like. “That’s my job. And—and almost every one of you is _extraordinary_. And—” Y’shtola could hear, just barely, Tataru drawing in a deep, wavering breath, over the scrape of the (probable) dustpan. “And none of you make it easy.”

Neither of them spoke the words directly, but the both of them knew very well what the other was talking about (it was always what everything was about). So many already fallen—dead or lost or even worse—all in service to the realm, and it never got easier—but…

“I do it not just for the realm—but for all of you.” This time Y’shtola didn’t look towards the door as she spoke, head bowed. “To give you the future you deserve.”

Once again, she heard Tataru sigh. “So do I, dear.”

And after that they were silent again, Y’shtola’s bowed head meaning she watched her reflection, broken by the ripples on the surface. She sat and thought, listening to Tataru cleaning in the next room—until, sure enough, she could make out Tataru beginning to sing to herself again.

“Thank you,” Y’shtola whispered, to herself and this time if Tataru heard it, she gave no sign of it.

By the time Y’shtola finally thought she was ready to actually wash and get out of the bath, the water had gone tepid and the sun was nearing the horizon and Tataru was still busily cleaning in her room. “Just a little tidying-up,” indeed.

“I’m almost done!” As if Tataru could read her mind, there was her voice, bright and cheerful as when she’d first come in. “Just going to take out these dirties to be laundered!—Oh, oh, one thing, Y’shtola—” Tataru paused and, evidently interpreting Y’shtola’s grunt and stilling of the water-sloshing sounds as permission, continued, “There was a little book in one of your pockets, I’ve taken it out and put it on top of your gift!”

Y’shtola softly laughed. She’d almost forgotten about Aenor’s little present… “Thank you, Tataru.”

“Don’t mention it, dear!” This was accompanied by the sound of a latch and a hinge—but before the door shut again. “Oh—and one more thing, I’m sorry, it almost slipped my mind completely!”

“Yes?”

“Urianger told me to say that he wants to see you,” Tataru said. “That he wants to apologize.” She closed the door behind her.

 

When she came out into her room, the first thing Y’shtola did was shake her head, smiling. Tataru’s idea of a “little tidying” had left her room near-spotless, with the prominent exception of her desk and shelves (in keeping with her promise that she wouldn’t snoop). It almost felt more like an inn room than her own—excepting that inn rooms with gifts were generally too rich for her blood.

Y’shtola gently pushed the book aside, for now, and lifted the bundle under it. It was only perfunctorily wrapped, in parchment paper that fell away quickly, to reveal what Tataru had made for her: a sweater, dusty indigo and slightly fuzzy, loose and long enough to almost be a dress, with long, slouchy sleeves and a turtleneck that could’ve fit an adamantoise, and knitted from a yarn as soft as her own fur.

“It even has a pocket,” Y’shtola murmured to herself, smiling as she held it up to herself, to gauge the fit. Apparently, just as she’d thought when she was first measured for it, Tataru had indeed decided she needed warmer clothes and that she’d been losing weight she shouldn’t have—but unlike before, the thought didn’t provoke much irritation. Instead, she just felt… warm.

Although it was more than large enough to fit over her nightclothes, Y’shtola didn’t slip it on, content to hug it to her chest, until she heard a stray crinkle, and after a moment groping-around, realized it came from a piece of paper in the pocket of the sweater. It was only a little note, Y’shtola realized as she pulled it out—a torn scrap of paper, folded twice, and with just four words written on it:

_page 32_

_good luck_

Curious, Y’shtola tilted her head. She recognized Clemence’s neat, narrow, tilted script, but—page 32 of what?

Brow still furrowed, she searched her memory. She couldn’t recall talking about research specifics with Clemence within the past moon, nor any book recommended or given or—

Then her eyes fell upon the book given to her by Aenor, and she did a double-take. _No_ … Looking back to the note she squinted at the writing—but no, that was definitely Clemence’s hand—or at least not Aenor’s, which was smaller and rounder overall, unless someone had a previously-undisclosed mimicry skill. But then, why go to the trouble of subterfuge? No, the only sensible explanation was that that really was Clemence advising her to…

With a truly silly amount of nerves, Y’shtola laid down the sweater and the note, and picked up the book from where she had brushed it aside. It had no title nor author on its cover nor spine, and its frontispiece had no words, just a blandly pretty illustration of flowers in a basket. So—she flipped ahead to page 32 and sat to read.

…And when she had finished page 32, she read on, to the end of the book, then flipped back to the beginning for pages 1 to 31. Having finished it, she laid back on the bed, thinking, and smiling. By now, it was truly night outside her window, and drawing near to the bell when she should sleep. Instead, though, she took the sweater and the little book, and went to change.


	9. Chapter 9

For the final time that week, Y’shtola descended the stairs to the archives. It had been late enough that there was no one else to encounter along the way, all other scions in bed or at least retired to their own rooms, but somehow she was still confident that Urianger would be there, at his desk, poring over some great dusty tome. With catlike tread she wound her way through the stacks and shelves without difficulty—after all, she could find her way through with her eyes closed now.

“Urianger?” Y’shtola called his name softly as she drew close to his little corner, hoping not to startle him. “Are you there?” The question was polite but rhetorical: no one else would have been there to leave a single light aglow on his desk.

“Y’shtola?” She heard him, anxiety in his voice and in how quickly he stood to receive her, his chair legs skidding on the stone floor.

“Yes, it’s me,” Y’shtola said, as she stepped around the shelf and into the light fully. He stood at his desk, attentive, slightly nervous—and, she instantly noticed, with his goggles and aetherometer both set aside, the hood of his cowl down over his back. Like the previous time, his eyes betrayed little of his feeling that the rest of him hadn’t already, but for direction of his gaze, but… She gave him a moment to adjust, then continued, “Tataru said you wanted to see me.”

To adjust, because she was doing something she usually did not—or rather, not doing something she usually did. Urianger was, as ever, calm and respectful, but Y’shtola was sure from the pause before he spoke that he needed a moment to recollect what his thoughts were after seeing her bare legs.

“I did,” he said, and took a deep breath as Y’shtola walked to her chair and sat down. “I must needs apologize to thee. In word and deed, I have done thee wrong.” He leaned down, face obscured by his hair, both hands resting on the surface of his desk, as if he needed to brace himself for what he was about to do.

She nodded, a simple signal for him to continue, still wearing a neutral expression that masked a pique of her curiosity: Urianger had said “in word and deed,” and she was aware of only the words, the harsh ones they had exchanged yesterday.

“I spake to thee cruel words, yesterday,” Urianger began, slowly. “Moreover, ‘twere born of a reprehensible desire to hurt thee, rather than any noble intent. I was not master of my emotions, and—” He took in another deep breath, and Y’shtola reflected on how this seemed rehearsed, yet still difficult for him to say aloud—his voice trembled the barest amount, and there were pauses that disrupted the natural cadence. “—and so I did hurt thee, for which I am truly sorry.”

“Both of our emotions were running high, yesterday,” Y’shtola said, and opened her mouth to say she accepted—but he interrupted her.

“I was not finished. That is one way I have wronged thee—but in reflection over the past day, I realized that there is more I must be held to account for.”

“Go on,” Y’shtola said, soft and approaching gentle. Urianger’s voice was pained, and it made her wonder how much time he had spent in self-flagellation.

“For this entire scheme of mine, o’er the past five days—I fear for thy health, but did allow this fear to lead me to attempt to deceive thee, subvert thy will to persuade thee preserve thyself. It is unbecoming of me, as a scholar, as Louisoix’s student, and—”

“Urianger.” Her voice was firm, and now she crossed her arms over her chest. “I accept the first apology. I reject this one.”

“My lady—” His head had bowed ever more over his desk as he apologized, but now he jerked it upright with an expression of startled dismay, his hair falling over his face and in his eyes… “I—”

But she held up one finger, for just one moment, and he fell silent again. “We were both emotional yesterday. I too have come to regret some of what I said. But…” Now it was her turn to take a deep breath, centered and feeling nerves crackle in her belly, “I will not let you stand there and apologize for loving me.”

He took in a breath, but other that there was silence between them after she finally said it. The twisting of her own nervousness, betrayed by the slow swishing of her tail from underneath the hem of her sweater, at last compelled her to continue. “Nor will—I will not apologize for love, either. As you can… as we can see. So to that extent, I suppose I accept that particular—”

“Peace, mistress,” Urianger sighed, closing his eyes, his expression betraying a certain fragility, but even as she watched, most of the tension went out of his shoulders. “I have never known of a power on this star stronger than thy will. I imagine, now, that I never shall.” A thread of wry humor was in his voice—and, unraveled, Y’shtola could hear it as forgiveness.

“I can’t—Urianger, I can’t make promises,” she began, taking a deep breath. “But—knowing what I kn—and hearing, from you and…” Her tail lashed, she realized that her previous crossed arms had turned to hugging herself through Tataru’s sweater, and she was no scholar of prophecy and verse but Gods, usually she could at least express herself, why was she— “I understand,” Y’shtola finally said, setting her jaw stubbornly despite the feeling shining in her eyes.

Again, silence. After a moment in which her confidence wavered and her gaze dropped, she returned it to his face, watching for subtle feeling in his lips, brows, eyes… “Thank you,” he said at last, and smiled.

And as warmth filled her, soothing and quieting her nerves, she continued “I wasn’t finished, though,” in her more usual, more daytime tones (as much an act as they were now). “I have something—I was advised by our allies that it would help.”

From his expression, he had not been expecting her to turn to business—but he had adjusted swiftly, folding his arms, leaning against his desk, and looking to her with professional interest. “Yes, my lady?”

“It’s in this text—” here Y’shtola pulled that little book from the pocket of her sweater with a perfectly straight face. “Only I have one request,” she said, standing to deliver it to him.

“Yes?”

Her fingers brushed against his as she handed over that little book. “Read it to me, as you did these past days.”

Urianger didn’t even open the book to check what it was before softly answering her: “As you wish.” His hands lingered near hers, and she thought for a fleeting second he might take hold of hers, perhaps raise her knuckles to— “Where shall I begin?” He asked, walking round his desk to sit at his chair.

“Page 32, please,” Y’shtola said, then quickly— “And please, sit in my chair.”

He gave her a look of penetrating curiosity—knowing there was something else here, but Y’shtola’s face betrayed nothing but calm contentment even as her tail delightedly swished behind her, curling from left to right. At last he sat down (and the sage green chair that had been so large for her accommodated him perfectly) and flipped through the pages to the fateful number 32. Y’shtola held her breath. This—even more than what she had said before, this was the moment everything hinged on. She held still, but inside she thrummed with a ferocious energy as she watched him look it over—watched his brows come together, then rise and rise—watched his lips mouth along some words, where he paused, hesitated, once licked and twice bit them—and she waited for his verdict, either to accept or decline.

Urianger raised his eyes from the book he held to her face, searching. She allowed herself to smile, and he nodded once. “My lady,” he said, in his perfect voice, the second syllable dragged pleasantly, the first and third, light and trailing like wisps of smoke… her smile widened.

And still wearing that smile, Y’shtola strode to where he sat and thought she saw him draw in breath and hold it as she approached… and hopped onto the arm of the chair, perched as delicately and daintily as if she were a cat. His response was to raise one eyebrow at her, to which she pointedly crossed one knee over the other, taking note of how he immediately, reflexively glanced to the motion of her leg and then the way the hem of her sweater rose, and offered no further clarification nor edification.

(Let him wonder).

“You may begin,” she said primly, coiling her tail such that the tip brushed against his shoulder. Urianger cleared his throat, twice, and then obeyed.

“I have known a bird to sing while still in the egg,” he began, skipping silly things like titles, starting rich and velvety, as textured yet measured as his words, “and seen it hatch, still singing in the nest. I have known joy before I knew your heart, and found it replaced mine own in my breast.” Meditative—that was the word for his approach: contemplative as a monk or friar, and yet—and yet, even if Y’shtola didn’t already know where this was heading, she would have had an idea. Just an idea—he was subtle—but an idea was enough to curl secret and warm in her belly, to shiver like a phantom touch over her shoulders and spine, to stir a restless wanting just awaiting instruction. An idea was, for now, enough.

“But now there is no joy, or love, or art,” he continued, precise in pauses so as to seem lingering, even lazy, “but that which is made by your smile, at rest in your soul—” the sweet consideration in Urianger’s caesurae almost made up for the absence of his voice during, “—sung by your voice, and in the part secret, sacred, hidden between your legs.”

The magic of his voice (the only joy remaining and Gods but she believed it) was such that Y’shtola felt the sheer pleasure of its sound slide over and around her before the meaning penetrated—and even knowing before how it all went, it was still two separate delights, the promise and the wet tongue voicing it. From her perch she leaned to his shoulder, as if she were trying to read along, but rather drawn to his mouth like a bee to honey.

“I have known a flower that blossomed in its seed, and have seen it split—” (Y’shtola felt a thrill drop along her spine) “—its petals now unfurled.” She leaned closer, deeper in, daring to rest a hand on his shoulder and almost letting out some kind of needy sound when he with his free hand pulled her in so he took her weight, not just the feel of her touch. But any sound she made, in comparison, would— “I once knew myself as only flesh and bone, and when I first saw you…” Urianger paused, ostensibly for Y’shtola to readjust her position, but then he whispered, “there I saw the world entire, sacred; fertile fields unsown,” desperate as a mendicant and twice as reverent, embracing the longing potential of those words like a lover.

“Mmm…” Y’shtola draped one arm around his neck, unable to help herself anymore, and he tilted his head against hers.

“Atop it only you mattered, in silk and gold and pearls,” and that now she not only heard his voice but _felt_ it, his chest rumbling against her hand and head to head, vibrating even into her bones, lent even more sincerity to the words, and as it delighted her to imagine herself in words he spoke, so she did, closing her eyes. “Tempting me with every pleasure I have known—your name is the Word I beseech and plead.”

The capitalization was not in the text but gods, _gods_ it was in his voice, deeper than summer twilight, soft and warm and inviting—and having been so invited, Y’shtola slid all the way into his lap. She and he both knew some things about magic words—and when spoken by a magic tongue, the compulsion was irresistible and she wanted it too badly to dream of trying.

And there was more.

“I have known a fruit to ripen still in its bud,” Urianger murmured, and the meter and repetition of the verse, in his voice, turned a metronome to a mesmerist’s pendulum, “and drunk deep of its nectar, sweetly sugared.” And _yes_ , it was this part, Y’shtola remembered, pulling herself in closer— “I have known joy and sorrow, fear and delight: Your name has them all, and I have heard it ring beautiful as a bell…”

Sitting in his lap and pressing herself against his chest, every vibration of every breath moved her, echoed in her body against his, a grounding force in contrast to the sound of it, which threatened to carry her far away and high into the sky. Joy and sorrow, fear and delight, syllables swinging bell-like, like churchbells calling to the faithful and leaving Y’shtola afloat as if on the wind, unsure if she was the devotee or the deity to be worshiped.

“…Day and night, I’ve wrapped my lips around it—” _Oh, gods_ , Y’shtola thought, her prior doubt resolved in something near a delirium of delight; she shivered and Urianger tightened his arm around her shoulders, pulled her close to him as if his warmth could dispel any chill, as though he weren’t precisely the cause of all her shudders and sighs. “—I’ve hummed and purred, and swallowed my own voice—” Y’shtola swallowed a moan, turned it to a needy sound deep in her throat, shifting and squirming closer as if Urianger could save her from her own imagination, “—to have the right to cherish, to adore; a pilgrim kneeling in the mud.”

Y’shtola turned her head to face him and tugged at the clasp of his cowl, opened it and pushed it aside so she could kiss his collarbones, unsure which would be the more perfect: to mar his composure with desire or for his control to be as perfect as his voice, his devotion, the images he conjured in her mind.

“I have known you for one and one thousand years, and none,” and there, there he did have a hitch in his breath, but only transmuted it into a roughness, a _realness_ to his reverent worship, “and before you, holy and spoken, I am grounded, dumbfounded—” that rough tremble intensified, into something beyond a purr but below a growl, something wondering but certain all the same “—by your spell, I live and I die.”

Y’shtola had been holding him but now her embrace turned jealous, like it was her turn to shield him, like she wasn’t tormenting him with her lips upon his shoulder, then moving up his throat… “Our fates are open, your will unbroken,” his throat vibrated in her mouth, the apple of it twitching and bobbing and she opened her mouth in her kisses, consumed by the fanciful thought of _his voice in her mouth_ — “We may love, we may lie, you might hear and I may tell—” Urianger had to gasp for breath after that and it almost marred the delivery of the final word, almost turned it to a choked sound, but no, it was still as perfect as the rest of the line, the vibrations of the hums and even how he was almost jumping under her tongue and fingers. He swallowed, apple of his voice appetizing against her tongue, and voice raised loud as if there was something to drown out: “—of the future I have seen, and the tears it betokens—!”

And it _broke_. His beautiful voice, his perfect voice cracked on that final syllable and Y’shtola immediately pulled her mouth from his throat, and nuzzled against his chest in something like apology. But instead of voicing pain or chagrin, he sounded rhapsodic, ecstatic, as he finished: “But I have heard the bird singing in her eggshell, and I know there is nothing I must fear.”

The final note trembled in the air, and then there was only breathing—hers heavy and aroused, his ragged and throaty, like he’d run out of all his placidity, his calmness and composure, and needed to regain it. Then, the little book fell from his fingertips, and even as it hit the floor he was _embracing_ her, tight and with a fearsome desire.

“Urianger—” Y’shtola said—gasped, needful, like she was drowning, holding him like air and anchor.

“My—By the Twelve, my lady—” He loosened his embrace enough for both of them to breathe—Y’shtola took the opportunity to shift position, upright astride his lap with her feet tucked under her rear—and he trailed his shaking hands up her arms, to her shoulders. “Grant me leave to speak to you as a lover,” Urianger said, voice lower than ever she had heard it.

Stifling a mad little chortle into a chuckle, Y’shtola did not say _What do you call all of_ that, _then?!_ but instead nodded to give him permission—

—and immediately found out when he gently traced the angle of her jaw with his knuckles, and in a voice so quiet barely anyone but a god could have heard it whispered “Shtola…”

She drew in breath in a hiccuping sound, face heating, and nearly lunged for him, as much to kiss his face and run her fingers through his hair as to hide the torrent of emotion that alone had unleashed in her—and he reciprocated, one hand to hold her back, pushing her close to him, and the other cupping the back of her head as he tried to kiss her kissing him.

“Shtola,” Urianger breathed again, and she couldn’t discern if it was his fingers tweaking her eartip or his voice that made her whimper so, “Shtola, may I offer thee—”

“ _Yes_ ,” Y’shtola hissed, pushing her hips closer to him, motions near frantic. She didn’t need much more to reach a peak, and she was sure the same was true for him—gods, it already felt like a miracle she hadn’t somehow come untouched—yet he denied her, took his fingers away from her ears and held her hips still and had the unmitigated temerity to hoarsely chuckle at her needy whine.

“Not that, beloved.” Urianger leaned down and kissed her hair, the base of her ear. “Not yet. There is still much and more I’d do unto thee…”

Oh, she was going mad. Just as she’d feared, Y’shtola was being driven straight to insanity by this damnable man. “Like what?” she eventually asked, her voice as ragged as his.

In response, he only smiled—smiled and then she felt his hands on her hips seek the hem of her sweater and she frantically nodded, chanting “yes,” clawing ungently at the sleeves of his robes. She’d take his hands, gladly—if he had half the skill with his hands as with his mouth, then, Y’shtola thought wildly, she’d surely melt around them, melt to a useless lump and _gods_ but she was more than fine with that.

She wriggled her hips atop his legs, for the friction and to help the sweater finish riding up—and the exposure of her arse to the cool air made her shudder, the thin material of her smalls no insulation at all. Urianger made a pleased and then intrigued sound as his hands found them, sparing a moment to stroke the soft fabric. “I had wondered,” he murmured, voice husky, “if thou would bother, so naked and forward was thy intent…”

“I wanted you to wonder,” Y’shtola breathed, a very smug smile curling round her lips as he shivered in her arms.

There was more to wonder at for him, more answers to seek, as he pulled and pushed the material of her smalls aside and out of the way—when first she felt his thumb atop her mound she sighed, and then keened as he massaged it. With her motions she tried to urge him further, deeper, but Urianger remained a man of limitless patience. Well, perhaps then…

Instead of demanding pulls and tugs at his robes and sleeves, Y’shtola tried something different: She stroked up his back, firm, and her fingertips trailing into and along dips and curves—the body beneath his robes was different that she’d expected. Instead of a scarecrow of an elezen, all knobs and ribs, she found a body lean but strong—how? when? She measured the span of him with her hands, drawing them from his back to his chest—or she would have had she mind enough, instead all her thoughts swirled in sensation—the body under her hands and her body under his hands…

“Urianger, gods—” she whined, fumbling for the fasteners she knew had to be _somewhere_ , “Come on—touch me—do it _right_ …”

“Thou art greedy, mistress,” he said, chiding, but _gods_ he was obeying at last, instead of touching everywhere but his fingers slid between her legs—and, Y’shtola realized with a hitch in her breath that turned to a wave of shivering, he knew very well what he was doing: outside two fingers to spread and inside two _inside_ and thumb on her little nub and— “Greedy and loud,” he amended, and only then did she realize she had shouted from the pleasure of it.

Pleasure and frustration, that is—as sublime as it felt, she still hadn’t come—but she was so _close_. Riding his hand, her own fisted in the shoulders of his robes and _yanking_ him down to kiss his face, she could almost feel it coming—and then he pulled his hand away and she actually snarled. “Urianger—! You—!”

“Much and more,” he reminded her, before he stood and she had to find footing again. Terribly disoriented, only barely registering her smalls pulled down her legs till they fell off, she just had enough time to wonder if he was finally going to—no, he was pushing her down but not onto the floor: into her chair. She made an embarrassing noise, far too close to a squeal, as her rear hit the seat; even as soft as it was she was so terribly sensitive that it made a spike of pleasure/pain lance straight through her—and when her breath came back to her, Urianger was kneeling on the floor before her.

“Oh,” Y’shtola whispered, knowing what this meant.

“Shtola, pray allow me this,” he said as he laid his head along her knee—waiting for permission, she realized, and with a pang of strange self-consciousness spread them apart. “Allow me put my tongue to an even nobler use.” Y’shtola squeezed the arms of the chair, breathing labored, all to try and stay loose below her waist—not tensed up from the sheer excitement of it.

She had to spread wide to accommodate the width of his shoulders, as he leaned in—she’d never had a lover from the larger races, and the coolness of the air against where she was so wet and wanting reminded her of that, of this particular newness. But it didn’t last—he hooked one of her thighs over his shoulder, wrapped his arm over it and rested his head against it, eyes closed and lips parted in so blissful an expression… “If I were a starving man,” Urianger said in a raspy groan, “I’d yet forsake a banquet to taste…” His mouth was against her skin, his teeth scraped the sensitive inner flesh of her thigh and then he sealed his lips and sucked—on reflex, Y’shtola thought that it’d leave a mark—not that she’d show anyone _or wouldn’t she_ … Delighted she bent the leg Urianger supported, till she could stroke his back with her foot.

“Good boy,” she crooned, and he shivered almost violently, hishand atop her thigh squeezing as he turned his mouth to her other thigh.

“Thou canst not know what— _my gods_ —what it does to me, Shtola, please,” he muttered, his voice rising and falling like swells in a stormy sea, between kisses up and down the softness of her inner thigh, biting a path that led further, deeper… “I am—only, and ever, a servant, and…” he swallowed, looking up along her body, eyes as reverent as if he looked up from below a sacred monument. “With a thousand years, Shtola, I could still find more of thee to adore.”

Breathing heavily, Y’shtola let go of one armrest, and lowered her hand to his face—when she touched his cheek, warm and with a sheen of sweat, he whined—and when she brought her hand underneath and then up along his ear, in a firm stroke, he _moaned_ full-throated, ecstatic, and she couldn’t help but buck her hips forward, now panting and squirming with raw, white-hot _need_.

“Adore me. Now.” She issued her command with what little authority as she could muster and her hand now fisted in his hair, tugging his face closer—and he made a sort of choked noise that might have been “Mistress” but ultimately was irrelevant, because he _did_ , he plunged his face between her legs and from the moment his tongue slid against her folds Y’shtola was _gone_.

She was shouting pleasure to the heavens, yanking his hair and twisting like a banner in the wind, and he kept going—tongue inside her pushing, thrusting, thirsty and drowning, he nuzzled his prominent nose against her clit and he was relentless—she screamed something to that effect, she was vaguely sure, but—but _gods_ he was adjusting the angle of her body, her hips with the shoulder under her thigh and arm up over her belly, so that his tongue could hit that spot inside her and _oh gods_ , only one leg over his shoulders but both her feet were off the ground and she didn’t know when they’d touch it again, if they ever would and then—

And then he started speaking into her, just vibrations and sounds from how it was muffled, like that perfect distillation she’d dreamed and Y’shtola finally understood why some people called it the little death, because this was it, _it_ , it had to be it, her heart was exploding, stars were bursting behind her closed eyes and there wasn’t enough air in all the universe and she couldn’t control her motions anymore, both hands trembling fisted in his hair and legs up and bucking her hips as if she could fuck his face and this had to be the end. She couldn’t imagine living after this, she couldn’t imagine living _through_ this—how could anyone live like this? hoarsely sobbing and so sensitive she could swear she could count each strand of his stubble brushing against her lips, the microseconds he took for each breath, each edge of each tooth he gently slid along her skin until he at last slid his tongue out of her, pressed one final kiss to the top of her mound and relinquished her.

Y’shtola let herself collapse even more, slid out of the chair like she’d melted—somehow Urianger had the presence of mind to catch her, to which she expressed her gratitude by clinging to him like her arse was a thousand fulms from the floor instead of a few ilms, looking him in the face and, not even waiting for him to properly come into focus, whispering “Fuck me.”

For half a second he looked like he might contradict her, might say something lovely and stupid in that stupidly lovely voice of his about her sensitivity, about servitude—so she leaned up and ran her tongue all down the length of his ear and _bit_ the lobe. “ _Shtola_ —” was all he said and all he needed to, he ripped at his robe and tights until all was just loose enough to free his cock. Already pre-come was flowing from the head, and it entirely was so ruddy, blood-suffused from so long without contact—

“Fuck me, _please_ ,” Y’shtola crooned, to give him permission—he’d been such a disciplined and attentive lover, she doubted she had the capacity to come again that night but it’d be cruel to leave him after that. And further—

Urianger growled something like a plea as he positioned her hips and then something like a prayer as he hilted inside her on the first thrust—

—furthermore, _ooooohh_ , she was so wet and loose from the heights he’d sent her to that taking the biggest cock she’d ever had was as smooth as a dream, not even a hint of a burn, only a perfect ride.

“My mistress—too kind,” Urianger was panting in her ear, his cheek wet against hers and her arms comfortably around his neck. “Tight—soft and tight cunt, I— _Gods, I_ —” Y’shtola didn’t say anything, just nodded and squirmed and squeezed until—

“ _Shtola_ , I can’t—” and he came inside her, hot, wet, and sounding near-delirious, and now it was her turn to be the steady anchor as he sagged against her and her chair, panting like there wasn’t enough air in the world, looking like stars were bursting behind his eyes, and Y’shtola stroked his hair, fond recognition in her gaze, and meandering thoughts that if she had a thousand years, she probably still wouldn’t ever tire of seeing him like _this_.

“Take me to your bed,” she whispered to him. “I promise I’ll rest.”

And though it took him a moment to find the breath, when he did, he took her hand from his hair and brought it to his lips, reverently kissing each knuckle. “As you wish, Shtola.”

 

 

The Rising Stones were quiet the next morning—Y’shtola enjoying the peace in a more secluded part of an upper floor, reclining carefully in a well-cushioned windowseat. In one hand, she held open for reading a curious little book with neither title nor author on its cover and spine, while on the windowsill proper she had sat a dish of berries and cup of tea. So most of the morning passed in pleasant solitude for her—and when her solitude was disturbed, it was only by Tataru looking for a quiet place herself, to deal with some difficult figures, and her company was as pleasant as the previous restful solitude.

But nearing midmorning—

“Tataru? Tataaaru?”

That was Aenor calling, and hurrying after Tataru’s response, exclaimed “ _There_ you are!” upon catching sight of Y’shtola in the window. “I was going to be looking for you next!”

“Whatever for?” Y’shtola answered—not quite lazily, but not eagerly, either.

“A favor for Clemence—she wanted to check with you about something, that’s all I know.” Aenor shrugged, then she noticed what Y’shtola was reading and her face lit up. “I see you like my gift?”

“Mm-hmm,” Y’shtola hummed, through a mouthful of strawberry.

“Have you shown it to Urianger yet? Like I suggested?”

With a perfectly straight face, Y’shtola looked up from the book to Aenor’s expectant smile and said “I did, but sadly he only got through one page, I think.”

“What a shame,” Aenor said, impressing Y’shtola with her discreet play-acting. “Well, do you think he likes it anyhow?”

“Oh, I’m sure he does,” Y’shtola said, continuing their shared charade, until—

“As much as he likes the sweater?” Tataru interrupted, grinning widely, which swiftly turned to a triumphant cackle at Y’shtola’s scandalized expression.

“ _Tataru_!” She said, protesting—and the protest turning all the more vigorous when Aenor, laughing, said she was going to fetch Clemence. “Don’t you dare!”

“Catch me if you can!” Aenor called back over her shoulder, inspiring fresh gales of laughter from Tataru as Y’shtola, blushing fiercely, readjusted her position in the windowseat, clearing her throat, trying to regain a modicum of dignity.

“All right, dear?” Tataru asked, after she’d finally stopped giggling.

“ _Perfectly_ fine,” Y’shtola huffed—then “…Gods, you mean there wasn't just _his_ little conspiracy—!”

And Tataru was off cackling gleefully again. After a minute, Y’shtola allowed herself to smile at it all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the end! (I know the chapter counter says there is a tenth, but that’s only an appendix for the poems) I hope everyone enjoyed it!
> 
> (come ride this doomed ship with me)


	10. Appendix

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All of the verse appearing here I wrote myself, and, being that all of it only appears in dialogue in the story proper, I wanted to repost in the original format I drafted it all in so that I could check that i was getting meter and rhyme scheme correct, so that people could see it without interference if they wanted. Thank you for indulging me.

O, all men with ears to hear, all women with hearts to weep,

hear now the story of love’s labor gone to naught

before Fate’s pitiless reap,

hear the story of the Spinner’s twisted lot

of two knights and their beloved lady dear:

I relate it as best I know,

the tragedy of Roxanne, Cedrien, and Cyraneaux.

 

[…]

 

twin moons hang above me,

shedding white light ‘gainst the midnight sky,

twin moons of the Lover,

of holiness and beauty the most rarefied

 

Menphina through the heavens flies,

Dalamud most loyal follows,

between them a space most hallowed,

where only the highest do lie:

stars nestle between the moons,

light between light,

night behind night,

in these sacred rooms.

 

Clouds ebb and flow,

adrift on heavenly tides,

between the Lover just so

they the zephyrs ride.

The twin moons they sweetly cradle,

cotton-soft their embrace,

softer and darker than the finest sable,

how lucky by Fate to be so placed.

 

Yet I swear I’d spurn so heavenly a bed,

yet I know a place far softer to rest my head:

Let clouds and stars between the moons find sweet rest,

I’d rather forever sleep ‘twixt thy breasts.

 

[…]

 

For Fate was never so easily diverted,

nor less the capricious and wroth:

but a moon ‘fore their troth,

the Horde in fury malevolent descended.

 

[…]

 

“Bitterly began Roxanne to weep, and then to wail:

‘Traitor! I name thee’ cried she, ‘to rob me after true love’s travail!’

Yet unmoved was the witch, her face like stone:

‘I have fulfilled my part, the error is thine alone.

The spell shall return thy true love only—

and the man thou hast brought, that is not he.’

 

[…]

 

I have known a bird to sing while in the egg

And seen it hatch, still singing in the nest.

I have known joy before I knew your heart

and found it replaced mine own in my breast.

But now there is no joy, or love, or art

But that which is made by your smile, at rest

in your soul, sung by your voice, and in the part

secret, sacred, hidden between your legs.

 

I have known a flower that blossomed in its seed

And have seen it split, its petals now unfurled

I once knew myself as only flesh and bone

and when first I saw you there I saw the world

entire, sacred; fertile fields unsown

Atop it only you mattered, in silk and gold and pearls,

Tempting me with every pleasure I have known

You name is the word I beseech and plead.

 

I have known a fruit to ripen still in its bud

And drunk deep of its nectar, sweetly sugared

I have known joy and sorrow, fear and delight

Your name has them all, and I have heard

It ring beautiful as a bell, day and night

I’ve wrapped my lips around it, I’ve hummed and purred

And swallowed my own voice to have the right

To cherish, to adore; a pilgrim kneeling in the mud

 

I have known you for one and one thousand years

And none, and before you, holy and spoken

I am grounded, dumbfounded, by your spell

I live and I die. Our fates are open, your will unbroken

We may love, we may lie, you may hear and I might tell

Of the future I have seen, and the tears it betokens

But I have heard the bird singing in her eggshell

And I know there is nothing I must fear.


End file.
